"Whew, that was close..." Skygnaw let out a long, internal vent of cooling air.
"Good thing it's a transport ship without advanced scanning arrays, otherwise I would've been lit up on their HUDs."
Skygnaw had been en route to a potential lead found by Famine when he crossed paths with the massive Decepticon transport—the very one Skywarp and the others had arrived in. He had shadowed it out of curiosity, expecting his brothers, but the biological signatures and Autobot sparks radiating from within told a different story.
The Battle of Konnas Canyon had been a disaster. The Decepticons hadn't just lost the fight; they had lost their only long-range interstellar asset to the combined forces of NEST and the Autobots.
"Skywarp and Onslaught... absolute failures," Skygnaw muttered, his sparks pulsing with irritation. Without Megatron, the Decepticons were a fractured mob, and now the Autobots had a space-faring "Queen" on their board. With that ship's near-lightspeed capabilities, the mobility of the human-Autobot alliance had jumped by several orders of magnitude.
He pushed his engines harder, keeping low. Below him, the shifting sands of Egypt began to give way to the majestic, geometric silhouettes of the Pyramids.
Since the legendary battle between The Fallen and the Six Primes took place near the Star Harvester, Skygnaw had directed his Four Horsemen to start their search here. The Giza Plateau was the logical epicenter.
Before long, he spotted Famine standing near a smaller, less-frequented pyramid.
"Lord Skygnaw," Famine greeted, his heavy armor coated in a fine layer of desert dust.
"Famine. Lead the way."
As they moved toward a side entrance, Famine briefed him. "Master, I detected a specialized electromagnetic seal at the base of this structure. It matches early-era Cybertronian shielding protocols."
In this world, most pyramids were built by or influenced by ancient Transformers. Entering them wasn't grave robbing; it was a home inspection. They navigated a jagged hole blasted into the side of the limestone—subtlety was never Famine's strong suit.
Deep within the lightless tunnels, they were blocked by a twenty-meter-tall metal door, pitted and scarred by oxidation. Skygnaw's red optics flared as he initiated a deep-layer scan. The atomic lattice of the metal was unmistakable: Cybertronian相吸 (mutually-attractive) molecular bonding.
"Open it," Skygnaw commanded.
Famine gripped the edges of the door. With a screech of protesting metal, the seal broke.
Hiss—
A gust of stagnant, million-year-old air rushed out. As the dust settled, the light from their optics revealed a large, humanoid silhouette slumped against the far wall. Skygnaw retracted his weapon, his cooling fans slowing. There was no spark signature. No energy. Only silence.
He walked up to the ancient warrior, but as his metal fingers brushed against the shoulder plating to clear the sand, a soft poof echoed in the chamber.
The entire frame collapsed into a pile of grey metallic dust.
Skygnaw froze. A million years... Even Cybertronian metal, without the constant nourishment of Energon and a pulsing Spark, eventually loses its structural integrity. Temperature, humidity, and the slow creep of time had turned a legendary soldier into a pile of ash.
Skygnaw exited the pyramid and stared at the vast plateau. A sudden spark of intuition hit him. If the pyramids are tombs... is every single one of these a casket for a fallen Cybertronian?
The thought sent a jolt through his processors. "Famine, recall the others. We need a total sweep of the plateau!"
The excitement was short-lived.
Over the next few hours, Carnage, Pestilence, and Catastrophe systematically breached every unexcavated pyramid in the sector. They found nothing but "artificial asphalt"—the mummified remains of human kings. To the Decepticons, these priceless cultural treasures were just "biological debris," tossed aside as they searched for their own kind.
"Lord Skygnaw, no signatures."
"Nothing but humans here, Master."
Skygnaw looked at the desecrated plateau and sighed. It seemed his theory was wrong. While the ancient Cybertronians had built the first structures, the subsequent human dynasties had simply mimicked their gods, building their own stone boxes to house their dead.
"Enough," Skygnaw signaled. "Carnage, Famine, take your teams and resume the global search. Expand the radius. And stay clear of the human military—NEST is active."
Once the Horsemen departed, Skygnaw opened an encrypted channel to Alice.
[TRANS: Alice. I need Karl to mobilize his 'consultants' and government contacts. I want a deep dive into every historical text and archaeological rumor regarding 'Iron Giants' or 'Sky Gods.']
Searching manually was too slow. He needed the human information machine to do the legwork.
[TRANS: If Karl hesitates... or if his loyalty wavers... replace him.]
Skygnaw's optics were cold. He knew how humans worked. Once the "cripple" gets his legs back, the first thing he does is throw away his crutches. Karl, now a billionaire tech mogul, was starting to get ideas about independence.
According to Alice's recent reports, Karl had been making quiet overtures to the CIA. The Central Intelligence Agency—meddlers and busybodies who didn't know when they were outmatched.
"Karl... don't disappoint me," Skygnaw whispered to the desert wind. "If you reach for my throat, I'll bite your entire arm off."
The secret world of high-stakes logistics is never truly airtight.
Despite Karl's efforts, the massive movement of rare-earth metals and restricted chemicals to the "Edge State" (Alaska) had tripped a silent alarm in the basement of the CIA. Two weeks ago, a driver for a Karl Group convoy—a man who didn't smoke—was caught having a cigarette in his motel room. That tiny discrepancy led to a surveillance operation that traced the route back to the northern wilderness.
One night, Karl woke up. He wasn't in his Miami penthouse. He wasn't in his silk sheets. He was in a cold, windowless room, and the two models he'd gone to bed with were nowhere to be seen.
He spent the night in the custody of the Agency. By dawn, he was back in his office, but he was a changed man.
"Hey... are you going to agree to my terms or not?"
Karl gripped a specialized, untraceable phone, his face pale with anxiety. "He's asking for more. Historical documents. Ancient artifacts. He's looking for something big!"
"Patience, Mr. Karl," a calm, steady male voice responded. "The higher-ups are still debating your request for immunity and 'special protection'."
"Shit!" Karl hissed. "Everything is a 'debate' with you people! The Karl Group is slipping through my fingers! You're wasting my time!"
He slammed the phone down and took a shaky breath. After a moment, he reached under the lip of his mahogany desk and pressed a small, concealed button.
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