eugenesis-text

leadership, his career, his life. Nothing else registered. The Quintesson invasion had ended the moment
Kup invoked the Crisis Act. The planet had shrunk to a single room as soon as he’d closed the door.
224 Autobots, 28 of whom were off-line. Excluding himself and the appellant, that left an electorate
of 194: Afterburner thru Vroom.
Calculations rattled around his head. He had the ability to observe eight hundred moving objects,
compute their probable paths of movement, and determine the proper countermove in 0.05 seconds, yet he
was incapable of second-guessing a single Autobot vote. It was only now, crossing off their names in his
head, that he realised how little he knew about his troops.
How had it come to this He’d progressed from chartered surveyor to a member of The Five (Circuit
One’s band of special Autobots) to criminal profiler (Mechaforensics Division) to Optimus Prime’s treasured
advisor in a few thousand years. But ever since the attempt on Rodimus Prime’s life, back at Diosys, things
had been falling apart. Everything around him was crumbling, and he was crumbling too…
Autobots walked past his office. Throwback, Volt, Hotrider, Quark, Rev-Tone, Skram. Others
followed. No one looked at him. No one spoke.
Perceptor stepped into the office and closed the door behind him. Prowl had rehearsed a thousand
scathing opening lines, but in the event could only manage a barely audible ‘Well’
‘108 to 86.’
‘In whose favour’
‘Yours. Kup lost the appeal.’
‘I see.’
Prowl stood up, stepped outside, and headed in a direction opposite to that travelled by the other
Autobots. He was thinking only one thing:
86 against
‘Five quads of millitine solution, a plasteen burn unit and some microscalpels! Charge the circuit-slab
and hook up the tethene lube drip – we have widespread puncture wounds! Looks like a noidal break on
the left flank.’
Optimus Prime lay unconscious on the stretcher and dripped lubricant on Delphi’s clean white
corridors as he was pushed towards the medi-lab. The medical entourage swarmed around him and
exchanged glances. Cloudraker held an energon pack in either hand and gave orders, his expression
flickering with disbelief every time he looked at the patient.
‘What’s happened to him’ shouted Nightbeat, fighting for a place at Prime’s side. ‘Is he going to be
all right Why isn’t he conscious’
‘Someone get Nightbeat out of here!’ shouted Cloudraker.
Siren slipped inside the ring of medics, synchronised his pace with theirs and looped his arm around
Nightbeat’s shoulder. ‘You’re in the way, ’Beat – come on.’
Nightbeat dropped back and watched the medics disappear around a corner.
‘It’s really him, isn’t it,’ said Siren, looking at Nightbeat with fresh understanding. ‘It really is.’
‘And there is absolutely no trace of the Quintesson ship’ repeated Ultra Magnus.
‘None whatsoever. We can locate debris that were knocked loose in battle, but the actual ship –
nothing.’ Silverbolt looked up to check that the door was closed. He could hear the celebrations on the
bridge, the back-slaps and hand-claps and cheers of support for his triumphant team.
‘I don’t get it,’ said Mirage. ‘Surely we should be able to detect fuel emissions or a burnout signature’
‘It is possible that the Quintesson ship wasn’t completely destroyed. If its trans-warp generator was
hit, it would have materialised in regular space in mid-explosion.’
Mirage looked from Silverbolt to Ultra Magnus. ‘There’s something else, isn’t there Something
you’re not telling me.’
‘Our own trans-warp generator is operating at 45% efficiency; any lower and we too will be forced
back into reg-space.’
‘How long will it take to get to Cybertron’