by Devastron » Mon Jun 11, 2007 1:08 pm
- Weapon: Energo-Sword
A Brief History of the Cybertronian Civil War
4,000,000 BCE – 2006 CE
Roughly four million years ago, the Cybertronian Civil War began when the High Council ruling Cybertron attempted to have Megatron assassinated for prying too deeply into their mysteries. Enraged, the popular and ruthless Megatron soon rose to the head of the Decepticons as they battled against the Autobots, led by Optimus Prime. In the midst of the escalating War, Megatron took advantage of the conflict to mask his true goal – reactivation of Cybertron’s planetary engines in order to turn the entire planet into a Warworld. Once activating the engines and building his Warworld, Megatron would then use it to establish a galaxy-spanning Decepticon Empire. However, Optimus Prime and his Autobots thwarted the Slagmaker’s plan. The destruction of the machinery beneath Cybertron’s surface resulted in current-cycle Kalis’ wasted, blasted state.
As the Civil War raged on, both sides exploited Cybertron’s resources recklessly. Soon, it became clear that the War was no longer sustainable, and after almost 300,000 years of fighting, both sides found themselves on the verge of destruction due to the waning of Cybertron’s planetary energy. Knowing that a dead Cybertron was no prize to either side, both the Autobots and Decepticons accepted voluntary stasis lock, with each side setting up small “contingency units” – groups of specialist Transformers who revived from time to time to investigate the status of the planet and make sure the other faction was not acquiring some unfair advantage. For almost 3.7 million years, the Transformers slept, and Cybertron restored itself, slowly.
In approximately 100,000 BCE, both Autobot and Decepticon contingency units noticed that the planet seemed to have restored its core energy to levels acceptable for mass habitation. The Transformers were revived, and the Great Shutdown (as it came to be known) ended. The first order of business for each side was to improve the various solar collectors and other supplementary sources of power (such as Tyrest’s Collector Array Fields, which convert other forms of cosmic radiation). The second order of business was, of course, to rekindle the Civil War. Neither side had any trouble remembering how to kill the other, and so the battles continued, even growing in intensity thanks to readier access to energon from the restored Cybertron and upgraded power sources.
Of course, Cybertron’s energy could not last forever, restored as it was. Warning signs similar to those that preceded the Great Shutdown began to crop up. They were not as dramatic or dire as those of 3.7 million years previous, but they were troubling nonetheless. Decepticon scientists were the first to notice the signs, and thus the Decepticons began researching alternative energy sources, but the Autobots were not far behind. The Decepticons knew that their best hope for finding a new energy source for Cybertron was to seek out a resource-rich planet and exploit it to fuel their homeworld.
The idea of harvesting another planet’s resources was abhorrent to most Autobots, but even they had to take a more pragmatic view as it became obvious that there were precious few other solutions. However, they held off planning resource-hunting expeditions of their own even as the Decepticons prepared to launch theirs, in the hope that some technological breakthrough would prevent the need to exploit other worlds. The Decepticons, of course, were not so patient, and already had a target in mind, a planet mentioned in a four-million-old report from a planetary survey mission.
But before Megatron could implement his schemes to seek out the resource-rich planet and strip it of its energy, Optimus Prime and his Autobots struck with a fury almost unprecedented in the Civil War’s history. Massive Autobot offensives across Cybertron drove the Decepticons back on their heels, and Decepticon-dominated city-states like Altihex fell to Prime’s doughty warriors. Tremendous losses ravaged both sides, but the Decepticons were pushed back and into a defensive posture, galvanized into absolute viciousness by the dire threat of the larger Autobot forces advancing at them. The Autobots, wearied by battle but unbowed and outnumbering their opponents, marched onward, hoping that the enemy would bleed dry before they did in this war of attrition. Cybertron and its inhabitants had seen no more desperate times than these.
As the year 2006 CE passed on the planet Earth, half a galaxy away from Cybertron, the surrounded Decepticon defenders of Polyhex under the leadership of Shockwave and Starscream prepared themselves to repulse yet another Autobot attack from Iacon and the Tagan Heights. Thunderwing of Tyrest steeled his forces to hold the line against the army of Nova Cronum’s Fortress Maximus. Both sides girded themselves for what could be the largest battle seen on the planet since the Great Shutdown, and what could possibly be the final battle.
The battle began with unexpected swiftness as Autobot soldiers, led by Fortress Maximus, poured over the border of Nova Cronum, marching towards Polyhex. Decepticon defenders were quick to respond, clashing with Autobot warriors in what quickly became known as the ‘Killzone’ between the two city-states. The Decepticon defenders, outnumbered by the massive Autobot assault force, were pushed back to the defensive lines of Polyhex. The Autobots would affect a breach in the Decepticon lines, a move forcing Shockwave himself to join the battle personally, sending the last of his reserves to attack the flank of the Autobot forces.
Shockwave and Fortress Maximus clashed as the battle was fought with renewed vigor around them. The two Transformers tore into each other with astonishing ferocity, but neither was able to get a decisive edge on the other. With Maximus about to unleash one final volley on the Decepticon commander, Megatron himself entered the fray, putting Maximus in stasis lock with one blast of his fusion cannon. His arrival nearly turned the tide against the Autobots, until Optimus Prime himself arrived with more reinforcements. The two supreme commanders fought one another for the first time in a millennia.
The battle was brought to a close when Prime called in the recently completed Omega Supreme, whose raw strength and firepower tipped the scales decisively in the Autobots favor. With Omega Supreme at his side, Optimus Prime was able to force a ceasefire and force negotiations. The two supreme commanders agreed to meet on Cybertron’s first moon after being allowed to recover the injured and dead, but with Omega Supreme standing watch at Polyhex.
Unknown to the Autobots, the Decepticons have just completed a new army of soldiers based on one of the new Decepticon prototypes attacking the Tagan Heights. As Megatron plots what to do with his new army, a long lost planetary survey team travels back to their homeworld…
