Eclipse’s machine gun pellets slammed into Rhinox’s backside, catching him completely unawares. Most of the fire was directed towards the upper part of his body, and before Rhinox could turn around and return fire, the monitor screen that served as both a visual input and output for his system blinked off, leaving Rhinox effectively blind.

 “Hey, what the-!” Rhinox yelled, both in anger, surprise, and pain. (Luckily, his output speakers were still working.) His torso quickly swiveled around to face the direction the machine gun bullets had come from. However, he had no idea Eclipse was attacking him, as he had had no glimpse of her before his visual input had shut off.

 He didn’t have time to find out, however. Yelling in rage, Rhinox blindly fired at his attacker. Eclipse took a few hits to her right side, but quickly managed to dodge out of the way of the clumsy fire. Aiming her machine gun-talons at Rhinox’s midsection, she let loose another volley of bullets, this time hitting her target in a critical area.

 Rhinox collapsed to the ground, his systems giving out on him one by one. Before he completely blacked out, Eclipse heard him mumble something about déjà vu, and then everything was silent.

 Her work was not done, however. Eclipse walked up to the gizmo Rhinox had planned to activate and activated her comlink.

 Nighteye braced himself for the shockwave that Rhinox’s device would emit as it went off.

 And waited.

 And waited.

 And finally reopened his optics again, only to be greeted with the battle still going on in front of him.

 Worried, Nighteye quickly activated his comlink while dodging an incoming missile.

 “Rhinox, what’s going on? What’s wrong with the- Rhinox? RHINOX!? Slaggit all!” Nighteye cursed, kicking the rock in front of him in frustration.

 “Ow… bad idea,” Nighteye gasped, clutching his foot. “That’s it….”

 Activating his com, Nighteye managed to get Blackarachnia on the other end. She was actually only about two dozen feet away, but the battle was getting so noisy there was no way they could have carried on a conversation at that distance now.

 “Nighteye, what? Can’t you see I’m- urgh- busy!?”

 “Blackarachnia, something’s gone on with Rhinox. I can’t contact him.”

 “That is NOT good…”

 “I know. I’m going back in there to find out what’s going on.”

 “Be- TAKE THAT- careful!” Blackarachnia responded, pausing to return fire.

 “There’s no time for caution anymore,” Nighteye muttered as he shut off the comlink and flew back into the base amidst cover fire from Blackarachnia.

 I never thought it would be so thrilling to actually watch a battle from the rear lines… I don’t even have to worry about getting shot at, since my forces outnumber the Maximals so much!

 Scourge was interrupted from his battlefield observations by the familiar beep of his comlink.

 “Yes, what is it?”

 “Scourge, sir! It’s Eclipse! I’ve managed to take out Rhinox!”

 Scourge sighed in relief. “Good, that’s a load off of my mind. You remember your instructions, correct?”

 “Affirmative. The device appears to be run by both power from the base and an internal battery. Completely electricity-driven.”

 “Hmm, this may make it harder, then. Disconnect the power supply and then switch the chips while diverting the internal current to…”

 Scourge and Eclipse continued their tech-speak, Eclipse following every instruction of Scourge’s to the letter.

 Rattrap kicked a large ankylosaurus off of him, shooting the Predacon in the optics to momentarily blind it as Dinobot grabbed it by the tail and hurled it away from the base.

 Amidst fending off various Predacons, Rattrap could see that the battle was NOT going well- not that that was much of a surprise, really. Tripredacus and Magnaboss had gone after each other, naturally, and both were now basically taking turns punching each other.

 That was the only battle that seemed to be evenly matched, however. Bruticus, the huge three-headed guardian of the alien site, was smashing Predacons left and right, but there were simply too many of them, even for him. Since Bruticus was obviously one of the greatest threats, the Predacons were concentrating on him first- in fact, over a dozen were now hanging off of the huge bot, hacking or blasting away at his armor. One of Bruticus’ arms had already been rendered useless, and two more were also well on their way to oblivion.

 Gryphtron had been severely injured in a joint attack by two aerial Preds, and Rattrap realized that Tigerhawk and Triceradon couldn’t cover him for much longer, as they too were weakening rapidly. The rest of the Maximals were in similar situations- holding their own, but just barely, and it obviously wasn’t going to last much longer.

 Rattrap had hoped for a miracle similar to what had happened the last time they were in this situation, but he quickly saw that there was no way out this time. They were corned in this large, dead-end cavern, with the only way out being blocked by a mass of Predacons, including Scourge himself, who Rattrap knew better than to mess with.

 “We’re…really… all going to die…” Rattrap said waveringly, half-heartedly throwing another of his grenades at an incoming Predacon.

 “For once, Rattrap, you get no argument from me,” Dinobot growled while shooting his eye beams at the same Pred.

 He actually called me Rattrap… yep, this is definitely my last day among the living…

 “Hands off the device, Airazor- NOW!”

 Eclipse immediately twirled around from her position near the gizmo, facing Nighteye and pointing her talon-guns at him all in a split second.

 Nighteye just stared, his gun still trained on Eclipse, although his posture now showed that he was less than sure of himself.

 “H-how did you react so quickly to me?” he stammered. I’ve never SEEN someone move that fast…

 “I was programmed that way,” Eclipse smirked.

 “…Programmed…?”

 Eclipse chuckled darkly. “Do I have to spell it out for you? I’m NOT Airazor- at least, not the Airazor you knew. When Airazor died, Scourge took me in, gave me artificial intelligence, and then sent me back to you guys with a mission. I’m Eclipse now.”

 I had no idea Scourge had that much technical knowledge in him…Nighteye thought to himself.

 “Well, so Scourge is quite the schemer, there…”

 “Oh, it gets better,” Eclipse said, “I’m not bound by the rules of those Transformers with sparks. Meaning…”

 “…You no longer have a weak spot…” Nighteye finished darkly.

 “Exactly. So, how about it, Nighteye?” Eclipse smirked, lowering her talon guns. “Wanna take a free shot at your former comrade? I’ll give it to you just this once.”

 Nighteye narrowed his eyes. Turning our own comrades against us… Scourge, are there no limits to your madness!?

 “Fine,” Nighteye whispered, opening up fire on Eclipse’s torso. The first couple of shots starting to eat their way through Eclipse’s armor, but she was ducked a split second afterwards… sending Nighteye’s last couple of shots right into Rhinox’s gizmo.

 “NO!!!” Nighteye cried, kicking himself mentally. How could I not have SEEN that coming!?

 “My turn,” Eclipse said calmly, unleashing a barrage of firepower Nighteye’s way. Nighteye shuddered under the assault before transforming into owl mode. His targeting optic locked on Eclipse amidst the fire, and a huge blast of laser fire erupted from his other optic, hitting Eclipse right in the head and burning off the left side of it.

 Eclipse didn’t even wince, however, and continued her barrage of Nighteye, who was now forced to duck back behind the doorway- his wings now had so many holes in them he doubted he could fly anymore.

 She’s like an undead corpse… Not even a direct hit to her slaggin’ HEAD did anything! I guess I’ll have to go after her the old-fashioned way…

 Roaring in pure fury, Nighteye transformed into his robot mode and charged back into the room, shaking the bullet hits to his torso off in his rage and slamming full-force into Eclipse, knocking them both to the floor. Nighteye relentlessly punched Eclipse’s torso repeatedly, internally vowing not to stop until he was sure she was offline. He didn’t get more than half a dozen punches in before Eclipse kicked him off of her. Quickly transforming into her vehicle/animal mode hybrid, Eclipse fired half a dozen missiles nearly point-blank at Nighteye, blasting him against the far wall. Nighteye slid weakly down to the floor, his chest leaking purple Vexoran blood profusely.

 Eclipse hovered up to Nighteye’s broken and beaten form slowly, relishing the moment.

 “Y’know,” Eclipse said, “Usually a ‘bot in my position would say something haughty right now, but I like to cut to the chase. Bye.”

 Eclipse fired a final missile at Nighteye… or rather, where Nighteye was a split second ago. Before even Eclipse could react, Nighteye rolled out of the way, leaving the stones under him blackened by the missile impact.

 Gwh! He must have not been as hurt as he appeared… Eclipse thought bitterly, transforming back to robot mode.

 Nighteye jumped up and sliced off Eclipse’s left wing right as she turned to face him- in fact, had she not turned just then, he would have sliced right through her chest.

 Wait… sliced?

 “Where’d you get a sword!?” Eclipse screamed, launching herself at Nighteye, who parried her lunge by sidestepping and slicing off her right arm.

 “Phht... you really think I’d be so big-headed to think that I could take whoever had knocked out Rhinox by myself? Perhaps I would have killed you if you had been any other Predacon, but I wasn’t about to stake the entire fate of the Maximals on it. So I grabbed one of Grimlock’s spare swords from storage before I came here.”

 “But… why didn’t you use it against me before?”

 “Quit buying time. I think you’re smart enough to figure it out,” Nighteye growled before advancing on Eclipse again. With his now-extended range, Eclipse couldn’t get out of the way this time, and he sliced cleanly through her torso, cutting her cleanly in two places.

 Nighteye continued to keep his battle stance as he watched Eclipse’s two halves, looking for any sign of movement. After several seconds, he finally relaxed and kicked the robot halves over to the other side of the room before focusing his attention on the device.

 “Sorry Rhinox, but you’re gonna have to wait a little while,” Nighteye murmured to himself, one of his hands clutching his bleeding stomach while the other tried to sort through the damage he had inadvertently caused earlier. “I’ve gotta get this repaired… now, how did Rhinox tell me to do this again? Oh, right…”

 Scourge was worried. Slightly.

 Oh, the battle was going marvelously. But he hadn’t heard anything from Eclipse in nearly three cycles, even though she was required to report back in one cycle. Perhaps she had run into some trouble, but she should have been able to take care of it quickly…

 Suddenly, his comlink crackled to life.

 “S-sir! Eclipse re-re-reporting…”

 “Eclipse, where were you?! You’re supposed to report in every cycle!” Scourge scolded.

 “I know, sir…” Eclipse responded, “But I r-ran into some… trouble. I have not been able to defeat him, sir, but… you need to e-evacuate their troops from the premises! Immediately!”

 “WHAT!?” Scourge roared. “WHO could you not handle!?”

 “N-Nighteye- but please! Hurry! I’ll get out by myself-”

 Eclipse’s message was interrupted as Scourge ripped the comlink out of his arm and threw it onto the ground.

 “Ahhh… there we go!” Nighteye replied, reconnecting the last pair of wires. “This should work, now… C’mon, please…”

 Nighteye shut both of his optics as he pleaded. Slowly, he reached over to the button, pressing it.

 Nighteye winced, expecting a huge force field wave to hit him.

 But nothing happened.

 Again.

 Before Nighteye could try to figure out what had gone wrong, a warning flashed on the emitter’s small monitor.

 “Warning…? Talk about bad timing… must have mis-wired the time clock, or something… Anyways… Emitter 49-7C, tell me what’s wrong.”

 “E-e-energy-gy signature de-device not wo-orking. Secondary th-thermal scan device online-ine. Th-ermal scan lo-osing power quickly.”

 “Slaggit!” Nighteye cursed. “That means it’ll no longer be able to pick up any Pred signature, just any Transformer that has a warm-blooded alt mode…”

 “Po-ower will fa-ade in 2.3 c-cycles.”

 “It’ll have to do,” Nighteye muttered, pressing the emitter’s button again.

 Dinobot was cornered.

 Rattrap, the ‘bot who had been covering his back, had been taken out by a shot to the head. Dinobot wasn’t sure whether Rattrap had bought the farm or not.

 But he was certain of one thing: he was about to.

 At least six Preds had him pinned against the wall, and most were taking turns punching him in the head. It certainly wasn’t long now until Dinobot’s face caved in.

 Suddenly, Dinobot felt a huge pulse wave slam into his back, and then everything faded into black.

 Rhinox stood outside the entrance to the Ark, watching with an impassive face as the bodies of Rattrap, Beastbot, and Bruticus being lowered into the lava.

 Had his makeshift body been equipped with hands, Rhinox would have saluted like all of the other Maximals present.

 The three Maximals had all died in the line of duty- died in what was supposed to have been the Maximal’s last battle.

 “Supposed to” being the key words, there.

 Nighteye’s last-ditch effort at reactivating the emitter had worked. The emitter had converted all of the present Predacons into Maximals- all of the Predacons that had warm-blooded alternate modes, at least. According to Nighteye, he hadn’t been able to get the actual signature detector working again, and had to rely on the secondary thermal-scan backup system.

 So now the sides were evenly matched again. The scales of power were balanced.

 All of the Predacons that had remained Predacons after the pulse wave- the ones with cold-blooded alternate modes- had quickly realized that their own former comrades were suddenly turning on them and fled the cavern. The Maximal army- and it could now be called an army, as it was three times its former size- had immediately followed the Preds and taken back the Ark and the surrounding area.

 That was a week ago.

 Temporarily splitting their forces between the Ark and the alien site, with constant communication between both places to ensure another surprise attack would not take place, the Maximals had cleared out any remaining Predacons that were too injured to retreat.

 Rhinox had ordered that no quarter be given, and none was. The six or so badly injured Predacons were executed the next morning.

 After that business had been taken care of, Rhinox had ordered the alien site destroyed, so that the Predacons couldn’t tamper with it in the future. The Maximals could not keep their forces stretched between two places forever, so they had to choose one place or the other, and the Ark was the obvious winner.

 Finally, with the army’s new size, Rhinox had established a more formal and permanent chain of command. He was the leader, with Nighteye his second-in-command. Grimlock was the general overseer in matters of battle strategy, while Prowl made sure the base and its systems ran smoothly. And disputes amongst any Maximals were to be settled by Sigma Prime, who had proven to be one of the most level-headed of them all in the past couple of weeks.

 As Rhinox’s optics settled over the rapidly-melting form of Beastbot, his thoughts turned to Ramulus. The ram had been unusually emotional since the battle, refusing to talk to anybody and staying holed up in his personal quarters. Rhinox understood why, of course. Beastbot had been Ramulus’ only friend, and now that he was gone… Ramulus was alone. Even though he was surrounded by more Maximals than ever.

 Just like me… Rhinox thought sadly as he watched the lava eat up the last remains of Rattrap.

 Now that the funeral ceremony was over, the Maximals present slowly dispersed, going back to some duty or another.

 Ironhide, however, trudged up to Rhinox, obviously reluctant to begin speaking.

 “Um… Rhinox… Dinobot, Silverbolt, Gryphtron, and Tigerhawk are leavin’ now. Do you want us to send them an escort until they can get far enough away from ‘ere where the Preds’ wide-range scanners won’t be able to detect ‘em?”

 “No,” Rhinox bitterly replied, surprising Ironhide.

 “B-but…”

 “They knew that this was the only way out, Ironhide. If their radically idealistic sense of ‘honor’ is keeping them from realizing that this is better than having the entire universe being unraveled by the Preds, than this base has no place for them.”

 “Well, to be fair, sir… you really didn’t tell many of us until AFTER the plan had already occurred.”

 “Because THIS is what would have happened!” Rhinox burst out. “We’d have had any ignorant Maximals deserting us before the battle began! And we can stand to lose a couple Maximals now a lot easier than we could have back then!”

 “So… you want us to say goodbye to them now then, sir?”

 “Yes,” Rhinox growled. “And tell them that they can watch their OWN backs from now on.”

 “Yes, sir,” Ironhide replied, saluting before running towards the entrance of the base to say goodbye to his comrades one last time.

 Yes, we won alright, Rhinox got that part right… but at what price?

The End

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