Post by The Doctor on Nov 14, 2007 23:33:02 GMT
From June 2002, this was originally intended for The Last Odyssey fan-project, but was just dropped from the final publication. It appeared in the TMUK weekly serial version as 'Redshirts III', a multi-writer story featuring some fan created characters.
---
Once, long ago, there lived a race of sentient wheel nuts. They occupied one small corner of one proportionately small and dingy laboratory in a secluded and forgotten part of the underworld of planet Cybertron. How exactly sentience had come to the wheel nuts they could not say and frankly they did not care and so just got on with the important business of living the wheel nut life. Living, dying, fighting, going to wild parties, drinking far too much alcohol and being sick all over attractive members of the opposite sex, accidentally walking into lampposts and so on. The usual things that life occupies itself with.
This went on for quite some of their time as mighty and great wheel nut civilisations rose and fell, occasionally making expansionist plans to the far wall but never quite making it due to a lack of oil, a lack of ambition or a lack of brains. The military tended to employ the hard of thinking it seemed and as they became the dominant force in the wheel nut way of life this was rather unfortunate. Thus, began the downfall of the wheel nuts.
Now, they may have been able to recover from this and reach previous heights, or at least come within spitting distance, were it not for one very, very important incident.
Up, up above the wheel nuts warred a race of beings known as Transformers. Alas, one of their bombs impacted above the laboratory, opening up a hole from above into which he who referred to himself as Wheeljack fell.
Wheeljack was in what is non-technically known as 'a bad way' and was not entirely competent with regards to his faculties. In his dazed state, he was capable of something he probably wouldn't have been able to do : he was able to notice that the wheel nuts were alive, which was of course impossible.
"That's impossible," remarked the Transformer before going off-line, to be rescued at a later date.
Words have power and once these were released into the air, Creation noted it had made a bit of an error and every wheel nut life-force was wiped from the Universe. After all, their existence was impossible. It was just that no-one had pointed this out before.
The above tale has little to do directly with our ongoing tale so far but it illustrates one fairly fundamental fact: always be sure of how real you think you are.
-------------------------------------------------------
THE TRANSFORMERS: 'The Fairies' Last Stand'
Written by Ralph Burns.
-----------------------------------------------------
Since we last joined our heroic gang of Torquewrench, Drivestick, Hang Glide, Iguanus and the other one -
"Fireguard."
There was a lot of fighting and shooting and heroic cries of "I'll get you decepti-creeps!" (though in the heat of battle no-one would actually admit to having said that out loud) which resulted in the present situation, which consisted of all of the above being chained to a wall by rather evil looking restraints while Sideswipe looked on unpleasantly. Or rather, everyone but Drivestick.
"I'm a traitor, you see," mentioned the very Autobot.
"What?! No? How?" said someone in a shocked manner, probably Torquewrench.
Sideswipe appeared unhappy. He had recently botched an execution of one of this lot. Still, everyone had an off day and he had managed to snag that Boleria fellow who had tried a laughable escape attempt that had lasted exactly five seconds flat before he was reduced to his component atoms.
It's also worth mentioning at this point that Iguanus is also unchained (there was a lot of tedious back story about how he was really still loyal to the old Decepticon ways and that way of thinking had always worked for him, blah blah blah but that won't be repeated here for clichés are everywhere and are to be watched for).
Star Saber too was in the room and hasn't been remarked upon up until this point mainly due to the fact that he'd had his attention occupied by a book. Unusually, it was made of paper, was rather small and didn't make 'beep beep' noises when the pages were turned. One of the captives on the wall, who was starting to feel rather tired by the events of late, pointed out that this was just taunting surely or at the very least just a bit silly. Where were the rants, he wanted to know? The threats for information or death?
"No, no, no." Star Saber carefully put his book down on a handily nearby table. "It is just that you pathetic fellows really are somewhat beneath my attention and I've wasted enough quality thinking on you already. I wanted the A-list cast of the Odyssey. Instead, I get the runts of the litter. Your lives are over, your story is told and there is nothing left to say. So I'm going to execute the whole lot of you."
Sideswipe opined that this seemed, on the whole, to be a good idea. No-one would miss this stupid lot taking up good wall space and it would be something to do. It had mostly been a quiet week, just the one exploding pub.
Star Saber paused in his perusals for a moment. He leaned right up next to Hang Glide. "Don't tell anyone, this is a little known fact about me, but I'm a big fan of alien culture, you know. I've been reading this old Earth book about fairies."
The Autobots boggled their minds for a moment over this. Someone pointed out this was just getting a bit ludicrous now. Hydrastar, who wasn't there and has nothing to do with what is going on, what with being on a spaceship in deep space which is about to explode in eleven seconds, would certainly have agreed with this sentiment. Had he been there, which as has already been pointed out, he wasn't.
Sometimes, life is easier to understand when people are shooting at you.
"Fairies." It's Star Sabre, giving his gloating speech now. "A human creation. Mythic. Some of the human race claimed to have seen them, to have taken photographs which proved that they were real. However, the evidence was never quite conclusive enough. Never quite so substantial. And so the fairies passed into myth and other, more epic myths took their place until at last the fairies were forgotten."
Star Saber turned to face Drivestick "And that is what you are, what we are. Parts of a myth half forgotten. The Legends have gone onto their higher place and we are left behind, like the fairies of old Earth."
At this point, Drivestick was written out of existence by several high explosive yields from the last being to have spoken. "Well, there's someone else who certainly won't get into Jn'wann," said that voice again, he who was Star Saber.
Out in space, Hydrastar's starship exploded violently, instantly snuffing out the life of its occupant. No conflict, no conspiracy, just the twin bad luck of a faulty fuel line and a deranged computer which felt that playing scrabble was more important than fixing the fuel line problem. No one present in the scene currently being described had any knowingly direct connection to this event nor would ever learn of it, but then sometimes life's just like that. Even Scrabble can be a killer.
Star Saber, clearly trying to make some metaphysical point, then killed Iguanus (who said something strange about how he wished he'd fixed the triple word score algorithm before he popped out of this life) before engaging in a little joke about dispensing with Sideswipe. The latter did not initially seem to find this particularly funny and waggled his robotic eyebrows furiously.
"You - you fiend!" yelled Torquewrench, perhaps feeling left out of events.
"Yes." said Star Saber and killed him too.
At this point an enemy force, with a remarkable sense of deux-ex-machina, choose this point to attack the Ministry. This caused a very lucky power loss to the restraints and Hang Glide and Fireguard slipped out of those selfsame restraints and ran away. Very fast. Except for the bit when Fireguard knocked Star Saber over in the confusion and told him in no uncertain terms: "I am not a fairy!"
Down long and excitingly lit corridors ran the two Autobots, searching frantically for a way out. They could have transformed and burst out of the exterior walls or just popped out of the clearly marked 'EXIT' door back in the torture chamber but when one is in a panic, one tends to forget common sense.
BOOM BOOM BOOM went the soundtrack of outside.
At this point they found a door marked '........', i.e., not marked at all. This was unusual as all of the other doors were marked, i.e. 'Smelting Pool Spare Parts', 'Spare Matrix Casings', etc - Star Saber certainly had an original sense of humour.
The two Autobots made their way inside and found a large swirling mass for which there aren't decent adjectives for, hanging cheekily in the air, thumbing its' metaphorical thumb at such conventions as shape or form.
There was then lots of exposition about how this was a top-secret experiment to produce a Generation III Space Bridge but it had lots of technobabble and blank stares so be thankful it's been omitted. There was some swearing though, so that's been left in.
"By the Celestial ******* Spires! How does the damn thing work!" was the point that Hang Glide made.
"Well it's not lighting my ******* darkest hour, that's for sure!" opined Fireguard.
Both Autobots tended not to resort to such unimaginative vulgarisms but then these were extraordinary times.
BANG BANG BANG went the fists of some people on the other side of the now locked door who very much now wanted to 'get' the two Autobots within. And by 'get', it wasn't autographs they wanted, it was the absence of the ability of the Autobots to make autographs after they had finished with them that they wanted.
"Well, we could always jump into it, I suppose." said Hang Glide, making perhaps the most important statement of his life. His companion commented, pointedly, that they had little to lose.
So they jumped into the Space Bridge, and went somewhere else entirely.
When Star Saber was informed about this by an embarrassed Sideswipe, he was terribly disappointed for a few seconds then forgot all about it and went off to do some planetary domination.
Everything was very odd. That's not being facile, literally everything was odd.
For starters, they seemed a lot smaller and were in a room not made of metal but out of wood and bits of animal.
The two Autobots attention was drawn to a primitive computer. It had a keyboard tucked under a little tray beneath a wooden table on which sat a monitor screen. Text characters scrawled down the screen.
Hang Glide squinted at the screen and tried to read what it said. It was difficult for it was in a completely alien language and his translation circuits were understandably a little slow after what the whole body had been through. He started with the first word.
Four letters.
The first was a 'T'. Then there was a 'M'. Jings, this was a difficult language to read. The third letter was a 'U'.
" 'K' " completed Fireguard. "Hmmm, funny word. Wonder what it means."
"The next line says 'The Transformers: The Fairies' Last Stand'. How very peculiar."
More reading revealed the astonishing fact that the rest of the words on the screen were all about the two Autobots themselves and what they had just done, and the words which described this were still writing themselves as they looked.
"We're on the 49th paragraph."
"50th now."
The carbon based life form with the headphones on who was tapping away at the keyboard possibly had something to do with what was going on. Hang Glide gently tapped the shoulder of the life form, who promptly howled in surprise and fell off his chair.
The two Autobots gazed down at the life form.
"But, but-" stammered the very life form in question as it squirmed on the comfortably carpeted floor, "You're not real! I created you! You can't be here! It's...it's impossible!"
It was at this point that Creation noted it had once more made a bit of an error and wiped Hang Glide and Fireguard out of the Universe. After all, their existence was impossible. It was just that no-one had pointed this out before
If only they had been more sure of how real they thought they were.
THE END.
---
Once, long ago, there lived a race of sentient wheel nuts. They occupied one small corner of one proportionately small and dingy laboratory in a secluded and forgotten part of the underworld of planet Cybertron. How exactly sentience had come to the wheel nuts they could not say and frankly they did not care and so just got on with the important business of living the wheel nut life. Living, dying, fighting, going to wild parties, drinking far too much alcohol and being sick all over attractive members of the opposite sex, accidentally walking into lampposts and so on. The usual things that life occupies itself with.
This went on for quite some of their time as mighty and great wheel nut civilisations rose and fell, occasionally making expansionist plans to the far wall but never quite making it due to a lack of oil, a lack of ambition or a lack of brains. The military tended to employ the hard of thinking it seemed and as they became the dominant force in the wheel nut way of life this was rather unfortunate. Thus, began the downfall of the wheel nuts.
Now, they may have been able to recover from this and reach previous heights, or at least come within spitting distance, were it not for one very, very important incident.
Up, up above the wheel nuts warred a race of beings known as Transformers. Alas, one of their bombs impacted above the laboratory, opening up a hole from above into which he who referred to himself as Wheeljack fell.
Wheeljack was in what is non-technically known as 'a bad way' and was not entirely competent with regards to his faculties. In his dazed state, he was capable of something he probably wouldn't have been able to do : he was able to notice that the wheel nuts were alive, which was of course impossible.
"That's impossible," remarked the Transformer before going off-line, to be rescued at a later date.
Words have power and once these were released into the air, Creation noted it had made a bit of an error and every wheel nut life-force was wiped from the Universe. After all, their existence was impossible. It was just that no-one had pointed this out before.
The above tale has little to do directly with our ongoing tale so far but it illustrates one fairly fundamental fact: always be sure of how real you think you are.
-------------------------------------------------------
THE TRANSFORMERS: 'The Fairies' Last Stand'
Written by Ralph Burns.
-----------------------------------------------------
Since we last joined our heroic gang of Torquewrench, Drivestick, Hang Glide, Iguanus and the other one -
"Fireguard."
There was a lot of fighting and shooting and heroic cries of "I'll get you decepti-creeps!" (though in the heat of battle no-one would actually admit to having said that out loud) which resulted in the present situation, which consisted of all of the above being chained to a wall by rather evil looking restraints while Sideswipe looked on unpleasantly. Or rather, everyone but Drivestick.
"I'm a traitor, you see," mentioned the very Autobot.
"What?! No? How?" said someone in a shocked manner, probably Torquewrench.
Sideswipe appeared unhappy. He had recently botched an execution of one of this lot. Still, everyone had an off day and he had managed to snag that Boleria fellow who had tried a laughable escape attempt that had lasted exactly five seconds flat before he was reduced to his component atoms.
It's also worth mentioning at this point that Iguanus is also unchained (there was a lot of tedious back story about how he was really still loyal to the old Decepticon ways and that way of thinking had always worked for him, blah blah blah but that won't be repeated here for clichés are everywhere and are to be watched for).
Star Saber too was in the room and hasn't been remarked upon up until this point mainly due to the fact that he'd had his attention occupied by a book. Unusually, it was made of paper, was rather small and didn't make 'beep beep' noises when the pages were turned. One of the captives on the wall, who was starting to feel rather tired by the events of late, pointed out that this was just taunting surely or at the very least just a bit silly. Where were the rants, he wanted to know? The threats for information or death?
"No, no, no." Star Saber carefully put his book down on a handily nearby table. "It is just that you pathetic fellows really are somewhat beneath my attention and I've wasted enough quality thinking on you already. I wanted the A-list cast of the Odyssey. Instead, I get the runts of the litter. Your lives are over, your story is told and there is nothing left to say. So I'm going to execute the whole lot of you."
Sideswipe opined that this seemed, on the whole, to be a good idea. No-one would miss this stupid lot taking up good wall space and it would be something to do. It had mostly been a quiet week, just the one exploding pub.
Star Saber paused in his perusals for a moment. He leaned right up next to Hang Glide. "Don't tell anyone, this is a little known fact about me, but I'm a big fan of alien culture, you know. I've been reading this old Earth book about fairies."
The Autobots boggled their minds for a moment over this. Someone pointed out this was just getting a bit ludicrous now. Hydrastar, who wasn't there and has nothing to do with what is going on, what with being on a spaceship in deep space which is about to explode in eleven seconds, would certainly have agreed with this sentiment. Had he been there, which as has already been pointed out, he wasn't.
Sometimes, life is easier to understand when people are shooting at you.
"Fairies." It's Star Sabre, giving his gloating speech now. "A human creation. Mythic. Some of the human race claimed to have seen them, to have taken photographs which proved that they were real. However, the evidence was never quite conclusive enough. Never quite so substantial. And so the fairies passed into myth and other, more epic myths took their place until at last the fairies were forgotten."
Star Saber turned to face Drivestick "And that is what you are, what we are. Parts of a myth half forgotten. The Legends have gone onto their higher place and we are left behind, like the fairies of old Earth."
At this point, Drivestick was written out of existence by several high explosive yields from the last being to have spoken. "Well, there's someone else who certainly won't get into Jn'wann," said that voice again, he who was Star Saber.
Out in space, Hydrastar's starship exploded violently, instantly snuffing out the life of its occupant. No conflict, no conspiracy, just the twin bad luck of a faulty fuel line and a deranged computer which felt that playing scrabble was more important than fixing the fuel line problem. No one present in the scene currently being described had any knowingly direct connection to this event nor would ever learn of it, but then sometimes life's just like that. Even Scrabble can be a killer.
Star Saber, clearly trying to make some metaphysical point, then killed Iguanus (who said something strange about how he wished he'd fixed the triple word score algorithm before he popped out of this life) before engaging in a little joke about dispensing with Sideswipe. The latter did not initially seem to find this particularly funny and waggled his robotic eyebrows furiously.
"You - you fiend!" yelled Torquewrench, perhaps feeling left out of events.
"Yes." said Star Saber and killed him too.
At this point an enemy force, with a remarkable sense of deux-ex-machina, choose this point to attack the Ministry. This caused a very lucky power loss to the restraints and Hang Glide and Fireguard slipped out of those selfsame restraints and ran away. Very fast. Except for the bit when Fireguard knocked Star Saber over in the confusion and told him in no uncertain terms: "I am not a fairy!"
Down long and excitingly lit corridors ran the two Autobots, searching frantically for a way out. They could have transformed and burst out of the exterior walls or just popped out of the clearly marked 'EXIT' door back in the torture chamber but when one is in a panic, one tends to forget common sense.
BOOM BOOM BOOM went the soundtrack of outside.
At this point they found a door marked '........', i.e., not marked at all. This was unusual as all of the other doors were marked, i.e. 'Smelting Pool Spare Parts', 'Spare Matrix Casings', etc - Star Saber certainly had an original sense of humour.
The two Autobots made their way inside and found a large swirling mass for which there aren't decent adjectives for, hanging cheekily in the air, thumbing its' metaphorical thumb at such conventions as shape or form.
There was then lots of exposition about how this was a top-secret experiment to produce a Generation III Space Bridge but it had lots of technobabble and blank stares so be thankful it's been omitted. There was some swearing though, so that's been left in.
"By the Celestial ******* Spires! How does the damn thing work!" was the point that Hang Glide made.
"Well it's not lighting my ******* darkest hour, that's for sure!" opined Fireguard.
Both Autobots tended not to resort to such unimaginative vulgarisms but then these were extraordinary times.
BANG BANG BANG went the fists of some people on the other side of the now locked door who very much now wanted to 'get' the two Autobots within. And by 'get', it wasn't autographs they wanted, it was the absence of the ability of the Autobots to make autographs after they had finished with them that they wanted.
"Well, we could always jump into it, I suppose." said Hang Glide, making perhaps the most important statement of his life. His companion commented, pointedly, that they had little to lose.
So they jumped into the Space Bridge, and went somewhere else entirely.
When Star Saber was informed about this by an embarrassed Sideswipe, he was terribly disappointed for a few seconds then forgot all about it and went off to do some planetary domination.
Everything was very odd. That's not being facile, literally everything was odd.
For starters, they seemed a lot smaller and were in a room not made of metal but out of wood and bits of animal.
The two Autobots attention was drawn to a primitive computer. It had a keyboard tucked under a little tray beneath a wooden table on which sat a monitor screen. Text characters scrawled down the screen.
Hang Glide squinted at the screen and tried to read what it said. It was difficult for it was in a completely alien language and his translation circuits were understandably a little slow after what the whole body had been through. He started with the first word.
Four letters.
The first was a 'T'. Then there was a 'M'. Jings, this was a difficult language to read. The third letter was a 'U'.
" 'K' " completed Fireguard. "Hmmm, funny word. Wonder what it means."
"The next line says 'The Transformers: The Fairies' Last Stand'. How very peculiar."
More reading revealed the astonishing fact that the rest of the words on the screen were all about the two Autobots themselves and what they had just done, and the words which described this were still writing themselves as they looked.
"We're on the 49th paragraph."
"50th now."
The carbon based life form with the headphones on who was tapping away at the keyboard possibly had something to do with what was going on. Hang Glide gently tapped the shoulder of the life form, who promptly howled in surprise and fell off his chair.
The two Autobots gazed down at the life form.
"But, but-" stammered the very life form in question as it squirmed on the comfortably carpeted floor, "You're not real! I created you! You can't be here! It's...it's impossible!"
It was at this point that Creation noted it had once more made a bit of an error and wiped Hang Glide and Fireguard out of the Universe. After all, their existence was impossible. It was just that no-one had pointed this out before
If only they had been more sure of how real they thought they were.
THE END.