eugenesis-text

Through the cockpit window he saw the Helio Complex, bright and scattered, as if someone had emptied a
bin sack.
An easy target.
‘Prepare to increase speed on my signal, team. Tight formation, no high-fliers. Low sweep, nice and
intimate, maximum damage. I want them to count the rivets on your afterburners before their heads
explode.’
Quark stood in silence and stared at the floor, mesmerised by its tiles and tramlines and patina.
Perhaps if he concentrated hard enough everything would just stop. Perhaps, if he could somehow tame the
vibrancy of the moment, the forward lunge of time would be stymied. All that was left would be December
25 th 2012, stretching backwards and forwards and outwards: mono-temporal, mimetic, and balanced in
every direction: an eternity of tessellating copper and chrome.
They were coming.
He could hear them.
He could hear their distant engines - so subtle that at first he thought it was coming from inside him
(a stalling fuel-pump or a lapsed ignition). He closed his eyes.
Prowl said, ‘Fire!’ and the rail guns raked laser across the sky. Tridents fell like sequins, twirling and
luminous, but the majority ploughed onwards and dumped their cargo. A stream of cluster bombs battered
the Archives Centre until thousands of solar panels were bubbling in the heat.
The battle-hangar vibrated like drum skin. The ceiling had already started to crack.
‘We’ve played our trump card,’ said Sideswipe. ‘Now they know exactly where we’re hiding!’
The Tridents regrouped for the second sweep, this time targeting the rail guns that poked through the
wreckage like chimney stacks. Another exchange (proton beams versus cold plasma), and a chimney
toppled.
‘Keep firing! Forget about power reserves, I want a constant barrage of aggressive fire! They don’t get
close! Crossblades, get over here!’ Prowl surrendered his seat and slapped the Pretender on the back.
‘They’re using a V formation – aim for the hinge.’
The explosions outside had lost their muffle and delay, becoming crumpled slabs of sound. The
Archives Centre was subsiding into the ground, pushed deeper by every batch of cluster-bombs.
‘First squads prepare to move,’ said Prowl via inter-Autobot radio, and watched Powerflash lead a
wedge of front-liners towards the exit. ‘You’ll appear three miles west of the generator. Once you’re
outside, remember that your primary role is defence. No cat and mouse games, no space-chasing, no–’
The world went white. Something formless and unspeakable rushed through the battle-hangar,
searing every surface – a new brand of super-flame, perhaps, streamlined and upgraded. The world went
red, then black, and then the smoke began to writhe and loosen.
Outside, the Quintessons thought they had won. After all, the Helio Generator Complex was levelled
and red-ringed, like cooling halogen.
Prowl peeled himself off the floor, leaving a black mark. ‘What – the hell – was that’
‘One of the rail guns exploded,’ croaked Perceptor, using one arm to forage for the other. ‘I estimate
we have three minutes before the ceiling collapses. I suggest we vacate the area before…’ A laserbolt
speared the ceiling, thinned to needlepoint between his feet, and dissolved. He looked up at the night sky;
the stars were eclipsed by Tridents.
‘Of course, I could be wrong.’
‘Dear god,’ said Prowl. ‘They’re in.’
And yet there was just… there was just something about him.
Nightbeat beheld Optimus Prime with a combination of awe and anxiety. The resurrected Autobot
leader was kneeling over Hoist’s knotted body, his hands – each one large enough to crush Nightbeat’s
head, chestnut-like, in its palm – patiently working the frayed wires, threading them like bootlaces. His
shoulders were almost too far apart, bending wide of a disproportionately small head. Sinews of metal
surged straight for the skull, ducking under a bullet-bruised helmet. And the ease with which he was