Exiles (42 page)

“No,” Megatron said, wary now. “And unless you’re Makeshift, you better step back before I step you back.”

Nexus Prime shoved Megatron away. “You remind me of a bot I once knew, and despised, and in the end should have killed,” he said. “Do not remind me of him.”

“I am Megatron of Cybertron, and I will do what I will,” Megatron said, leveling his fusion cannon at this impostor.

“And if I do what
I
will,” Nexus Prime said, “you will not leave this battlefield alive. Bot.”

“But I will leave this battlefield any way I want to, shifter,” Megatron said. “Because maybe you could kill me and maybe you couldn’t; I never met the bot who could. But if you are that bot and you take the time to do it, you’ll never get off this junkpile alive.”

He pointed toward the far angular edge of the planetoid, where the battle cruiser hung over the Ark and drew it ever closer. “You’re not a Decepticon,” Megatron said. “And I don’t say this often, but I wouldn’t trust you to be one. That makes you an Autobot. You want the rest of the Autobots going with that ship over there?”

Nexus Prime looked at Megatron. “What’s on your mind, bot?”

What was on Megatron’s mind was a fragment of a vision he had been given. In the moment when he and Optimus Prime had both been struck by the Requiem Blaster—with both of them so close to the Cyber Caliber—Megatron had been granted a momentary glimpse into Optimus Prime’s mind.

Perhaps the librarian had been given the same glimpse into Megatron’s mind, but if so, Megatron was perfectly willing to bet that he had gotten the better end of the deal. Because whatever the librarian had seen, Megatron had—for the briefest span of time, a time that made a nanoklik look like an orbit—known where the AllSpark had gone.

He didn’t have a name. He didn’t even have a distance. But he had a bearing.

He knew which way to go … 
and Optimus Prime did not know he knew
.

I was chasing you, librarian
, Megatron thought,
but now you can chase
me.

The shifter was gone suddenly.
Didn’t want to fight, after all
, Megatron thought.
No bot ever really does when they come face to face with me
. He swept into the
Nemesis
’s bridge to find the Decepticon crew reduced by one. “Slipstream never returned?” he demanded.

“Haven’t seen her since she went out after Optimus Prime,” Starscream said. “She’s probably drifting around here somewhere.”

Megatron thought for a moment. He hated to lose a Seeker, but the AllSpark was more important than any one Decepticon.

Except himself, of course.

“She’ll have to become a Junkion,” Megatron said with a cruel smile. “I’m sure they’ll welcome her if she can show she knows how to dig trash and weld it together.”

The
Nemesis
lifted away from the surface of what was left of Junkion.

“Megatron,” Starscream said. “We’ve got the Autobots down. We should finish them.”

“We are going after the AllSpark,” Megatron said.

“But we don’t know where the AllSpark is,” said Starscream.

Megatron tapped the side of his head. “We do now,” he said, neglecting to clarify the part about not having any idea of its distance. The direction was good enough, and the head start over the Autobots was critical.

He pointed ahead at the three remaining Space Bridges. “Now, let’s go.”

“Do any of those work?” Starscream asked. “The Junkions took the one apart that the Autobots used.”

Megatron shrugged. Whether they did or didn’t, it was an even battlefield. “Let’s find out. Now!”

Then, in front of the
Nemesis
’s bridge viewports, a huge cluster of what looked like Energon reservoirs floated into view.

At the same moment, Starscream said, “Megatron, the Requiem Blaster is starting to overheat.”

“Eject it.” Megatron said without hesitation. He briefly enjoyed the astonishment on Starscream’s face before adding, “With what I have learned from Optimus Prime, we no longer have need of it. Let us go.”

“Eject it? You’re not serious,” Starscream said.

“I said eject it!” Megatron slammed a fist onto the bridge console. “Get it away from us before it touches that reactor or overloads on its own! NOW!”

Thundercracker punched in the necessary commands.

There were two last things Nexus Prime needed to do.

As the Decepticons melted away, he stood near the edge of the pit. Down below was Optimus Prime. Approaching Nexus Prime, the pirate leader kicked aside bits of wreckage from the discharge of the Requiem Blaster.

Nexus Prime stood his ground and held up a hand to arrest the pirate captain’s progress.

“That is going to be your last action, bot,” the pirate captain said.

“I find that assertion ludicrous,” Nexus Prime said. “Permit me to explain the situation. You are going to leave because you bring chaos and because your misunderstanding caused misery, disorder, and death. In other circumstances I would kill you, but I sense you will yet have a role to play in the question of the AllSpark.”

“The role I have to play right now is to kill you,” the pirate captain growled, as he brought his cutlass down in a vertical swipe that would have bisected Nexus Prime had he not been Nexus Prime.

But it didn’t. No shock of impact ran up the pirate’s arm. No gush of fluids came sluicing out of Nexus Prime’s ravaged body. The pirate captain still held his sword, and Nexus Prime still stood where he had. Only
for a moment, as the blade had passed through the space occupied by Nexus Prime,
he had simply divided into two
.

Nexus Prime held up a sword that had not been there a moment before. “This is the Chaos Edge,” Nexus Prime said. “I will kill you with it if you do not return to your ship and release your grip on the Ark.”

He made a gesture, and a hole tore open in reality. On the other side of it was the pirate ship’s bridge.

“I am giving you one chance, just this one,” Nexus Prime said. “You would be wise to take it.”

Initially the Autobots were jubilant at the sight of Megatron abandoning the battlefield. They had no idea why, but this was the first time they had tasted victory since well before leaving Cybertron. However it had happened, it had happened.

Alone among them, Optimus Prime was not ecstatic. “Autobots!” he commanded sharply. “To the Ark! The time for celebration is not yet!”

Confused but responding to their leader, the Autobots instantly mobilized in the direction of the Ark, which was lifting slowly away from the surface again. Silverbolt streaked out ahead.

Optimus Prime could not celebrate with them and could not tell them why. He could not admit to them that in Megatron’s moment of insight into his mind—that moment when they had been melded completely together by the incredible energies released at the firing of the Requiem Blaster—Megatron had learned which direction to go if he wanted to find the AllSpark.

He would go, and the Autobots could not let him get a head start.

That was why it was more important for the Ark to be freed than for the battle against the Decepticons to be
won. Before they could rally, Megatron would be gone …

… And from such small moments were wars won and lost.

All of this he thought as he climbed up out of the pit for the last time and saw that Junkion was suddenly empty of all bots save his own, who were sprinting toward the Ark. And in the middle of it all, Optimus Prime noticed Wreck-Gar’s reactor floating right in front of the Requiem Blaster.

Out of nowhere appeared Nexus Prime. “Watch,” he said, and pointed up toward the
Nemesis
, with another ship nearby. Optimus Prime had not seen it before.

“What is that?” he asked.

“Time is very short,” Nexus Prime said, ignoring the question. “Get your bots on the Ark.”

Optimus Prime noticed something else. “The Space Bridge,” he said. “The one that led to Solus Prime’s tomb. It is gone.”

Nexus Prime nodded. “In time, perhaps, you will discover that place again,” he said. “The Matrix will guide you there when you have need.”

Optimus Prime was shocked to realize that Nexus Prime was addressing him as a comrade, as an equal. Nexus Prime winked. “And now,” he said, “it is time for me to go. This looks like a marvelous time to be alive.” He grew serious for a moment and locked optics with Optimus Prime. “You are doing very well,” he said. “You lead your bots with strength, and you will succeed if your purpose does not falter. Be well, Optimus Prime.”

“And you,” Optimus Prime said as Nexus Prime divided into five protoforms. All five stood for a moment, saluting Optimus Prime as each incorporated a piece
of the Cyber Caliber into itself once more. Then they lifted slowly away from Optimus Prime and accelerated away, streaking in five directions out into the vastness of space.

Optimus Prime stood alone, considering what Nexus Prime had told him. He did not always feel that he was doing well, but the Autobot quest survived and they had brought powerful allies out of an epochal exile. Perhaps Nexus Prime was right. Optimus Prime wanted to think so … but when he looked around at Junkion, it was hard to feel that anyone was right.

“Optimus Prime!” Perceptor said over the commlink. He looked up and saw the Ark very close, coming in low to gather in a small group of Junkions who had emerged from the wreckage. “There is a serious Energon instability near the Requiem Blaster. Something is going to explode there.”

“I know,” Optimus Prime said.

“We have recovered all the survivors we can find,” Perceptor went on. “And all Autobots are accounted for. The Junkions are requesting that we pursue the ship that captured Wreck-Gar.”

“In time,” Optimus Prime said. The Ark hovered low over him, and he climbed aboard it. When he got to the bridge, Sideswipe said, “There’s no working Space Bridge. Where do we go?”

Optimus Prime pointed out into space, in the direction he knew the AllSpark to be. “That way,” he said.

Between the remnants of Junkion and the three inert Space Bridges, the
Nemesis
, too, was curving around to that bearing, with the other ship close behind. Between them, drawn by the gravity of the Requiem Blaster, was Wreck-Gar’s makeshift reactor.

As Optimus Prime watched, the Requiem Blaster detached from the
Nemesis
, tumbling away as the
Nemesis
brought itself around and accelerated away. What was Megatron doing?

A moment later, he got his answer, as the reactor exploded and for a nanoklik a new star burned over Junkion.

The reactor had contained enough Energon that if it had detonated on Cybertron, the explosion would have destroyed an entire city and left a hole in the planet that never would have healed, Perceptor explained later. But the deformation of the gravitational field near the Requiem Blaster meant that its explosion had a different effect. Junkion, Perceptor believed, was completely destroyed and might never accrete again. The
Nemesis
and its pursuer? Perceptor was less certain, but the Ark’s sensors had, at the moment of the explosion, detected a rupture in space-time.

Megatron was alive. Optimus Prime knew that much. And while he lived, he would follow the Autobots and pursue the AllSpark. Optimus Prime had no doubt that his path and Megatron’s would cross again. And who knew what other roving renegade bands they might find? What other lost colony planets? What other cultures and forms of life?

“So we cannot know where Megatron is,” Optimus Prime summarized.

“That is so,” Perceptor said.

Optimus Prime looked around at his valiant Autobots. “Where are we?”

“The Ark was far enough from the explosion that our spatial dislocation was relatively minor,” Perceptor said. “We are still fairly near the former location of Junkion.”

“What damage?”

“Very little,” Sideswipe said. “The Ark’s as spaceworthy as it’s been since we left Cybertron.”

The universe was full of hidden surprises, Optimus Prime thought. How many sentient beings could pass directly by Vector Prime and never know he was there? Or never know what he meant to the entire history of Cybertron? Surely other hidden and revelatory treasures lay scattered across the galaxies.