From LetheRvr@aol.com Wed May 1 21:49:46 2002 Received: from imo-m05.mx.aol.com (imo-m05.mx.aol.com [64.12.136.8]) by grex.cyberspace.org (8.6.13/8.6.12) with ESMTP id VAA19514 for ; Wed, 1 May 2002 21:49:42 -0400 From: LetheRvr@aol.com Received: from LetheRvr@aol.com by imo-m05.mx.aol.com (mail_out_v32.5.) id z.b2.ae3d8c6 (4226) for ; Wed, 1 May 2002 21:48:17 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: Date: Wed, 1 May 2002 21:48:17 EDT Subject: Brawn, part 4 (last part) To: suz@cyberspace.org MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: AOL 5.0 for Windows sub 139 Status: O X-Status: The Transformers--The Chronicles of Brawn Part 4-the Deadly Trio Lights flickered all around, on and off, leaving areas in pitch blackness for a while, only to be lit again. Water from broken pipes poured across the rough metallic flooring, sparks igniting in areas where it came in contact with loose wires. Brawn tore through fallen pipes and kicked away boxes and other things that covered the floor. It was hard to believe that even in such a ruined condition, Autobot City in robot form was still a formidable warrior. As he got closer to the area that Blaster had told him about, he had to remind himself to slow down. Too many times in the past, he had blindly rushed into the heat of things, and had to pay by spending hours on end on Doc Ratchet's worktable. He could not afford to do that this time. If the Autobots were to stand any chance against the Decepticon threat, then the imposters must be stopped, and "Metrotitan" brought back into Autobot control. His grip on the large rifle got firmer, his audio sensors were turned up to their highest sensitivity, listening for anything that might alert him to his enemies presence... Slowly, he came upon the door that led to the control room. He glanced around the room, taking in all details. The lights gave out again to total darkness once more. Flickered bright for a moment, and then gave out again.. but in that moment, he could have sworn he saw... The lights came on again, and there before him was the ghostly form of Optimus Prime. "Prime...?" was all he whispered, in his astonishment, but that was all he needed to say. Suddenly, one of Sunstreaker's missiles came screaming out from the darkness towards his location in the dark, homing in on the sound. This time, however, Brawn was fully on guard. He threw his body to the left just as the missile impacted against the ground, creating a huge explosion and lighting everything up for a moment before fading again into blackness. Stupid, Brawn thought to himself, Obviously it wasn't Prime I saw, it was another one of Hound's holograms. Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me. So Hound was out there as well. Two of them against one, while the other must be controlling the giant robot. "Come out Autobot... we all must die sometime," he heard Hound yell out. Hmm... Brawn thought. What a stupid thing to say. He obviously wasn't going to give away his location again by replying, but Hound had just given his location up. And that suddenly gave Brawn an advantage. He crept slowly over to the area where he had heard the voice, knee deep in water from the burst pipes... and descended, going under the water and crawling under the currents. Infrared would have come in handy at this point, but unlike Gears, he wasn't gifted with it. However, the lights would come on again, and when they did. Time passed slowly in the dark, underwater, but he was patient. He had no need to hold his breath. He could wait as long as it was necessary, just so long as the Autobots outside were holding up as well. He felt the pull of the currents as they shifted to Metrotitan's joint movement at the shoulder. The lights flickered, and he saw a pair of thick green legs standing in the water to his far left. His reflexes took over at this point, shifting the weight of the laser rifle quickly to point up, take aim. Fire. The blast hit Hound's imposter dead in the face, taking it uncleanly off. Bits of metal and half of a robotic head were all that was left atop Hound's shoulders, and the false Autobot staggered backwards a few steps, mortally wounded, but still functional... Sunstreaker was ready for Brawn to attempt such a move though--letting Hound act as a pawn to draw him out into the open--and fired another of his missiles towards the activity. But he only succeeded in hitting Hound's body, which exploded into several messy bits. The blast knocked Brawn back however, throwing him against some broken bits of machinery, knocking his rifle away. By this time though, the battle rage in Brawn had fully kicked in. He sluggishly rushed Sunstreaker, held back somewhat by the water currents and hit the tall, vain robot dead on. The real Sunstreaker had considered himself to be handsome and a hard fighter-a reputation he had gotten from his times in the Cybertronian gladiatorial games. The crowds had loved him, and it had gone to his head. The reason they loved him though, was not due to his looks, but to the way he fought. Sunstreaker was a war machine. Sunstreaker wasted no time after being knocked back by Brawn's rush, and swung a hard fist around, backhanding him. Brawn fell back, quickly regained his footing, and threw a huge slab of broken machinery right at the robot. Sunstreaker was barely affected though, and walked casually towards Brawn. "You've got no chance with me, small one. I was built to be your destroyer. Not only am I bigger than you, I am better armed. What do you have to offer that could possibly hurt me?" As Sunstreaker began to load another missile through his arm, Brawn quickly jumped up and grabbed it. Squeezed it: hard. "I tell you what I've got... brute strength!" Brawn's powerful arms took hold of Sunstreaker's arm and refused to let go. The imposter tried to pull away, to knock Brawn against something by swinging his arm around at something. Still Brawn held on, like a determined angry dog, he held, pulling. Tearing. "Let go of me you bastard!" Sunstreaker cried out, but it was pointless. Brawn had already loosened it up, and with another hard yank, he had accomplished what he had set to do: He had pulled Sunstreaker's whole arm off. "Die!" the robot yelled in rage, firing a missile from his other arm that Brawn easily dodged. The imposters rage had unbalanced him, the aim was aweful. Brawn, however, was just getting started. He took the torn limb and quickly went to work arming (no pun intended) it for his own uses. "Let's see how well you can take your own medicine!" He took aim with the arm, and threw it--one of Sunstreaker's own missiles activated--right at him. The impact hit him hard, dead center, blowing a hole right into his chest cavity. Brawn stood there for a moment, water dripping off of him, staring down at his enemy. It was a little disconcerting fighting Decepticons who looked and acted like your friends. He sighed and thanked the makers that he wasn't built to think, otherwise he'd be bothered by it for ages. "Two down, one to go," Brawn said. He wasn't too thrilled about the next fight at all though. It would be against Huffer. And Brawn knew all too well that Huffer, although an endless whiner, was also a very strong fighter, when he wanted to be. Though not as strong as Brawn, he could easily get further damaged in a fight with Huffer in his already damaged condition. That, and Huffer had always been one of Brawn's closest friends. The strangest thing about Huffer, was once he had finally got home to Cybertron (or Moonbase One, at least), he found himself homesick for Earth. It had been on Earth, after all, that Huffer had found himself stretched to his creative limit, trying to build new tools and devices for the Autobots to survive in the organic envirnoment. Brawn himself was equipped with the energy conversion device Huffer had designed to let the Autobots run off of petroleum. Brawn knew that behind the door, it wouldn't be the real Huffer that he would fight, just a mindless clone being controlled by a Decepticon. But that didn't mean that it wouldn't hurt to destroy the clone. He took a quick glance at Sunstreaker's remains to make sure he was dead, and then opened the door unto the command center. * * * * * Huffer spun around from his position in the command center controlling the robotic form of Autobot City they were calling Metrotitan, to stare dead on at Brawn. "Hey there Brawn, 'ole buddy. What brings you all the way up here to see me?" The two robots began to circle the floor, sizing up the situation, neither one taking his eyes of the offer for an instant. "Cut the act, Decepticon. Huffer's dead, I saw his body. I know that you're nothing more than a mindless clone." "Can you be so sure, Brawn? Maybe it's the clone that you saw that died. Maybe I set all that up so that I could work secretly for the Decepticons, undercover. Maybe it was a secret mission that Prime wanted me to go on, without the rest of you knowing. Maybe if you'd let me explain what I'm doing here, you'd understand..." They continued to circle, and Brawn began to feel uncertain. Could it be that? Could this be the real Huffer, squaring off against him? There was only one way tell. "Shut down this city." "Can't do that, 'ole buddy. You're going to have to kill me if you want to do that." "Then I'm afraid that's what I'm going to have to do," he replied, and at that point, lunged straight for Huffer. Huffer was ready though, and hit him hard with an uppercut, followed by a body blow. Brawn's head went back, and then he felt his stomach dent in as the fist hit it. Brawn stood his ground, however, and quickly got his arms around Huffer's neck. He attempted to squeeze at the robots neck, twist it off if he could, but Huffer was quick to grab Brawn's arms himself, and using them as leverage, got his legs up and kicked Brawn square in the face. "This here robot is Decepticon property now. Finders keepers, loosers weepers," Huffer taunted, as Brawn was pushed back. "Give it up, you know you're no match for me, whoever you are. I'm stronger than Huffer, and also more skilled. There's no way you can win this one." "Normally, you might be right there, Brawn. But you see, I've added a few new tricks to my arsenal. Found a few spare parts laying around unused... and you know what a fixit type I am, don't you? Take a gander, at this!" Before Brawn's eyes, Huffer began to transform, as he did normally, but as he did, he saw something come out of nowhere, the trans-dimensional void where certain extra parts go when a robot transforms. And what he saw come out of the void, was something shocking, twisted, and disturbing. It was Prime's trailer. It hooked to Huffer's vehicle mode smoothly, locking into place on his more miniature orange cab mode. And then Huffer transformed back into robot mode, but this time, the trailer stayed, opening up to reveal Prime's repair bay, where a solid black Roller and a solid black colored attack bay. As Brawn looked at them, he could tell they were dead material, nothing more than a remote controlled extension of what was once Optimus Prime, now controlled by Huffer's clone. It still didn't change the fact that it was disturbing... or the fact that he was now very, VERY, mad. "Get him Roller!" Huffer yelled, pointing at Brawn. The small car burst forth from the attack bay, single minded, and slammed against Brawn, knocking him clear off his feet. "Ha! This should be fun," Huffer said. "You're definitely not Huffer, he wouldn't be enjoying doing this. Hell, he wouldn't enjoy anything." "You may be right there, Brawn. But you'll never know, will you? Attack bay, open fire!" The multi-tasked bay module suddenly came to life, and took aim at Brawn. The mechanical arm picked up a pulse beam, and hooking it to its self, began to fire at Brawn mercilessly. He found himself jumping behind a barricade, and pinned down there Huffer laughed again, and stood on the attack bay itself, safe from all the danger, content to sit back and watch Prime's trailer do his dirty work for him. Brawn, however, was keeping his eyes open, looking for some clue into how to defeat him. And he had to defeat him, otherwise he would take control of Metrotitan again. And without anyone else inside to stop him, there was no telling how much damage the imposter could get to. One thing he did notice was that as Huffer gave a command, he himself blanked out while the other part attacked. The same with Roller. Now that the attack bay was firing at him, it wasn't really moving at all. Whoever was controlling Huffer, then, wasn't adept enough at controlling all three pieces at the same time, like Prime was able to do. And, something that this Huffer had seemed to forget, was that Prime rarely ever used his other components for a reason: Each part was part of the whole-the pain of one was the pain of all. With that in mind, Brawn waited... "You can't hide out for ever! Roller, go find him and get him out here!" The black zombie Roller came round the corner, searching for Brawn... and Brawn was ready. With hand scooped down in preparation, he flipped Roller onto his back, and lifted him up as a shield before him, wheels spinning uselessly, going no where. The moment Brawn emerged, Huffer was ready. "Attack bay-fire!" It did just that... several fast, blue pulse beams in tight formation... and hit it's own Roller unit head on, as Brawn held it in front of him. "Awwwe...!!!" Huffer yelled in agony, hands flying to his face to guard himself from some pain he did not understand. Brawn threw Roller aside, letting it smash against the wall, and rushed forward while he had the chance, right up the ramp of the attack bay, and with full speed and fully charge anger, slammed into Huffer, and knocked the pain racked robot down hard. "Oh you little bastard... You never should have used Prime's trailer. Now I'm going to make you pay." And pay the robot did. Brawn kept him alive for a full ten minutes before destroying him. * * * * * Eventually, Brawn made it out of the innards of Autobot City and back on to the ground, where he was greeted by Blaster and Bluestreak, who had been fighting a hard fight against the giant form of Metrotitan. Looking at the ragged, laser pocketed robot giant, Brawn wondered if it was right to even have built the thing in the first place. Prime had always been against such super Autobots at one time, fearing that such weapons could be the ruin of the planet. Seeing how well Autobot City had survived-even though most of it had been destroyed, he had to agree with Optimus. If the Decepticons ever built a robot of the same size and power, such a fight between the two could destroy entire states in the process. "I'm sorry I doubted you, my man... there was just so much evidence against you, and I needed to lash out against someone in my anger." "It's alright, Blaster, I know how you feel. The sad thing is, with both moon bases gone, we may now be the only Autobots left to fight Megatron..." "Uh, correction there, Brawn, well, slight correction, anyways," Bluestreak began, "There is no more Megatron anymore, at least not as far as we know. Because what we do know, is when the Decepticons attacked last time, they were led by someone calling themselves Galvatron. Galvatron, yes. The Decepticon leader from the future that we met so so so long ago back in 1985. You remember him, don't you? So you see, Megatron must be dead. Only explanation." Brawn's eyes widened. Galvatron. Of course, it was 2005 now wasn't it? He remembered Galvatron, huge, powerful Galvatron, who had once traveled back in time to 1985 to escape something he called Unicron. Back then, he had almost single handedly destroyed the Autobot army. If he was leading the Decepticon army now, things were even worse. Oh well, they'd cross that bridge when they got to it... Suddenly, there was an explosion from the far east, deep in the mountains, sending up a billow of dust and rock particles. "Rewind, what the hell was that, over?" Blaster relayed through his communication. "Blaster... we were almost upon the Decepticon trio controlling the Autobot clones-turns out it was the Reflector robots-when suddenly they got away from us and escaped in a hidden space bridge! We were about to attempt to get the space bridge functional ourselves when we realized they had set it to self detonate! It was a choice of either save Sunstreaker and Hound or follow them on the spacebridge, and we chose to save the guys. I'm sorry, Blaster... they escaped." * * * * * Brawn hung around for a while after, but he was soon becoming restless. Autobot City would need to be completely rebuilt according to Blaster, and the fact that Brawn had destroyed the transforming cog itself when he threw Roller against the wall didn't help matters much. The huge robot had to be transformed back into city mode slowly, a little at a time, the whole procedure would take days, if not weeks to accomplish. Brawn cared nothing for that though. Blaster had ideas of building some sort of space mausoleum to carry the bodies of Optimus Prime, and the other Autobots who had died into space, as a permanent reminder of what had happened during the battle, so future generations would know of the great loss that had happened for all time. But again, Brawn cared nothing for that. Brawn had always seen himself as a fighter, nothing more, nothing less. And in the end, the Autobots had needed his fighting skills in order to save themselves from being destroyed by the Decepticons. But now, he saw himself as having moved beyond his original programming. The last few days had taught him that there was more needed in this war than just brute strength and "brawn." If he was to reach his full potential, as an Autobot, he needed to be willing to learn. The thing was, maybe he had realized all this too late. There were only a handful of Autobots left on Earth, and they would not be enough to fight the full massive Decepticon army, even if every one of them was an Optimus Prime. The numbers just weren't there. And if the Decepticons had a weapon that could destroy entire moons... well, there'd be no stopping them. Blaster and the others... they needed this time to rebuild. He'd give them that time, but they'd have to do it without him. Pulling the ring out of his pocket that he had taken from Ironhide, he knew exactly where he had to be right then. The only place left that had enough Autobots to fight the Decepticons, and perhaps turn the tide for the better. Cybertron. And contrary to what some other Autobots believed, there were still space bridges on Earth that linked to Cybertron. Driving away from the wreckage of Autobot City, on his way to a hidden, far away space bridge that would take him to Cybertron, he wondered absently what name they would come up for the thing when it was done. Certainly not Metrotitan, that was far too Decepticon-ish. Not that it really mattered what name they gave to the accursed metroplex, he would no doubt never have the chance to see it again. But he made himself a promise that should he ever get the chance to return to Earth, he would stroll the corridors of it, once more. Find the place where he had fought the Autobot imposters to a stand still. And there he would sit, alone with his thoughts, and read some more Zelazny. A demon wind blew dust at him from the east, as he traveled west. Nigel T. Bradley