Megatron's body was still heavily damaged, with a large chunk of his head completely missing, but the injuries no longer affected his movements.
Watching the warlord walk toward Sentinel Prime's ship, Skygnaw knew his suspicions were correct.
Megatron moved with total familiarity. He clearly knew beforehand that Sentinel Prime's ship had crashed here, and he knew exactly what lay inside the decks. Otherwise, he would have sent a few Decepticons ahead to scout the wreckage first.
---
Heavy footsteps echoed through the empty corridors of the starship.
Megatron didn't waste a glance on his surroundings, marching straight toward a chamber at the very end of the hall. Once there, he skillfully pressed a manual release switch.
With a sharp hiss of escaping air, the door of a vertical stasis pod slowly slid open.
A cold smirk played on Megatron's face. His single crimson eye locked onto the rusted frame exposed inside the pod. A faint, weak pulse in the chest proved that the owner of this body was still alive.
---
"Sentinel Prime," Megatron muttered.
He pulled out a glowing energy rod and shoved it straight into Sentinel's chest plating.
The injection rippled through the ancient leader, causing his frame to shudder violently. A moment later, the optics on his weathered face slowly blinked open.
*Where am I? I remember the ship being hit by a heavy Decepticon battery as we fled Cybertron, and then...*
---
"Sentinel Prime, it's been a long time."
The sudden voice shattered Sentinel's racing thoughts. The moment he laid eyes on Megatron, fury consumed him.
"Megatron! You dare show your face to me!"
"Save your breath, Sentinel," Megatron sneered. "Look around you. I'm the one who just saved your life."
---
Sentinel looked around the room, realizing the truth in those words. He had been slowly fading away inside the stasis pod until Megatron revived him.
"Don't expect me to thank you, Megatron." Understanding his situation, Sentinel ripped the remaining fuel lines from his back and stepped out of the pod.
He looked over Megatron's battered, broken appearance and let out a cold laugh. "Heh. It seems you aren't doing so well yourself, Decepticon leader."
---
"What's the matter, Sentinel?" Megatron countered, refusing to back down. "Are you thinking of starting a fight in here?"
"Oh, I forgot to mention, there's an army of Decepticons waiting for me right outside this ship."
Sentinel's eyes flickered, quietly abandoning his aggressive thoughts. When his flagship was attacked during his escape from Cybertron, he knew Megatron had set him up.
"How long has it been since the war ended?"
---
The moment he fled, Sentinel knew the Autobots were destined to lose without his leadership. The war should have concluded long ago.
"Not long. A few centuries at most."
"I've been asleep for centuries?" Sentinel looked down at his rusted, worn armor. "Speak plainly, Megatron. Why did you wake me up?"
---
He knew damn well that Megatron wouldn't perform a rescue mission out of the goodness of his heart.
"I came to deliver some news," Megatron said, getting straight to the point.
"What news?"
A mocking smirk touched Megatron's lips. "First, the AllSpark has been destroyed."
---
"What!" Sentinel stumbled back, his face filled with utter disbelief. "Who did it?"
"Don't get ahead of yourself, Sentinel," Megatron sneered, his mockery deepening. "Second, the Matrix of Leadership has also been reduced to dust."
Megatron proceeded to recount everything that had happened in the desert war, including the existence of The Fallen.
"The state I am in right now is entirely thanks to your star pupil, Optimus Prime," Megatron hissed. "You always wanted to save Cybertron, didn't you? Yet your precious student just destroyed our final ray of hope."
---
Sentinel fell into a heavy silence, staring at the floor. It was impossible to tell if he regretted passing his leadership to Optimus, or if he still resented Megatron for breaking his word.
After a long pause, Sentinel spoke up. "Why did you come to find me? What do you want?"
"It's simple." A cruel grin spread across Megatron's face, knowing his words had successfully breached Sentinel's defenses.
"An alliance. You and I team up. I help you save Cybertron, and you help me destroy Optimus Prime and the remaining Autobots. Every last one of them."
---
Sentinel snapped his head up, a dangerous gleam flashing in his eyes.
"Sentinel, if you..."
Before Megatron could even finish his sentence, Sentinel struck.
He drew his legendary Primax Blade from his back, a massive, double-bladed weapon with a central hilt that had claimed countless lives. With terrifying strength, he slammed Megatron against the corridor wall.
---
Sentinel pressed the razor-sharp edge flush against Megatron's neck, forcing out each word with absolute authority. "Let me warn you, Megatron: do not play games with me."
"Furthermore, I accept the alliance. But the execution will follow my rules."
His voice was aged, yet carried an符号 undeniable, crushing weight.
Megatron showed no trace of panic, his grin only widening. "Fine. As long as Optimus Prime dies, you hold the wheel."
"Humph. It better be that way."
---
Sentinel slowly lowered his weapon and immediately dictated his initial conditions. "Dealing with Optimus requires a long-term plan. We must move with caution."
"However, Cybertron is completely drained of energy; the planet cannot afford any more delays. I need you to return to Cybertron immediately and wipe out whatever Autobot resistance remains on the surface."
Sentinel's expression didn't fluctuate at all as he gave the order. He felt absolute zero remorse about ordering the systematic execution of the faction he used to lead.
In truth, that was exactly the case: to save his home world, he was willing to sacrifice anything and anyone.
---
"No," Megatron shook his head, rejecting the idea. "I cannot go back to Cybertron."
"If my presence registers there, Optimus will automatically follow with his forces. That will only make things far more complicated."
By now, Megatron was pragmatic enough to admit that in his current battered state, he simply couldn't beat Optimus in a straight fight.
"Then deploy a detachment of your Decepticons to handle it. Have them complete the task as quickly as possible."
---
"Fine, I know exactly who to send," Megatron agreed, his thoughts shifting to the commanders waiting outside the ship.
"During this time, your station remains on Earth. Make sure Optimus doesn't leave that planet," Sentinel instructed.
"I need time to verify a few things, formulas that might completely restore our mother world. That plan is the sole reason my ship calculated a course into this star system. If it works, our home planet will simply be occupying a new coordinate in space."
---
Outside the wreck, Skygnaw grew tired of waiting around. He gave Blackarachnia a quick word before heading back inside her scout ship.
With Megatron offline inside the Ark, Skygnaw held the highest rank and raw power among the remaining troops. Not even Blackarachnia could challenge his authority now, so no one dared to stand in his way.
Back inside the ship, Skygnaw reached into his chest plates and pulled out the twisted, triangular metal relic.
Ever since their hasty retreat from Egypt, he had been swept directly into Megatron's sudden lunar trip, leaving him without a proper moment to analyze this core treasure of Cybertron: the Matrix of Leadership.
---
The original timeline held very little data regarding the artifact's true nature outside of its function as a key for the Star Harvester. It was recorded as a direct conduit to revive and reinforce Cybertronian life. Beyond that lay nothing but cryptic legends.
Yet the moment his sensors linked with the metal interface, Skygnaw realized his initial assumptions were completely wrong. Dead wrong.
He stared at the Matrix with a remarkably strange expression. Whether it was a baseline security restriction or designed that way from its inception, the data was absolute: ordinary Cybertronians could not manually control the Matrix.
---
Only someone who achieved absolute harmony with its internal programming could extract its secrets or use its power to forge new life.
Wisdom was an abstract concept covering a vast spectrum of mental growth and strategic data. But the wisdom embedded within the Matrix felt like a consolidated database of empirical logs, compiled directly from the memories of its historical line of succession.
This detail created a massive logic loop in Skygnaw's mind. Historically, the Matrix had remained locked within the Dynasty of Primes. While ancient records didn't identify a permanent keeper, it had certainly never belonged to The Fallen.
Otherwise, the tyrant wouldn't have been forced to execute Solus Prime and Megatronus to get his hands on it.
---
He figured the Matrix must have been heavily guarded by Solus Prime or Megatronus before The Fallen murdered them and fled to Earth with the prize.
Because of this, the line of succession had never actually shifted; it had simply been borrowed by individual Primes to activate the Harvesters. Where did this database of successive owners come from?
"Perhaps only a true Prime holds the clearance to unlock the secrets of this relic," he thought.
For Skygnaw, the Matrix had become a paradox: monumental in value, yet currently completely useless in his hands. It was like staring at a reflection in water, entirely out of reach.
---
"Is it time to plan a return to Cybertron?"
Skygnaw hesitated. He had successfully broken into the Commander-class tier, sitting exactly one step away from reaching a status where he would answer to no one, bypassing even Megatron's oversight.
But progressing into a Leader or Prime-tier was no longer a simple matter of accumulating raw fuel or upgrading armor.
Over the cycles, Skygnaw had long noticed that Megatron's body suffered from catastrophic structural defects. The warlord was bound to notice them, yet he had never attempted to make repairs. Was it a lack of desire? Or a hard limitation of his spark's tier limit?
---
A Commander-class spark was born directly from the AllSpark's baseline splits. It was highly predictable that the entry requirements for a Leader-class evolution would be exponentially more ruthless. To make matters worse, his current thoughts held zero data on how to start the process.
Yet a deep instinct suggested that the key to his evolution was buried somewhere within the ancient ruins of Cybertron.
Specifically, the dream that had flooded his mind during his cold-cast reconstruction, back when his new body was being put together, mirrored the monumental events of the later eras. Previously, he had dismissed those records as myths, but after surviving this many loops, he knew every variable was possible.
---
"Cybertron," Skygnaw muttered, turning the pulsing Matrix in his fingers.
The deep blue light swirling within its core was incomprehensible to his baseline scanners, yet it was undeniably a fuel source far more refined than standard Energon.
"I must find a window to return to the home world. If my calculations hold true, the next phase should involve..."
Suddenly, his thoughts cut short. He immediately stowed the Matrix within his armor.
Megatron had exited the Ark.
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