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transformers-mosaic · 5 months

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Transformers: Mosaic #503 - "Home Is Where The Laser Core Is"

Originally posted on June 16th, 2010

Story - Juan Pablo Osorio Art - Oscar Choquecota Letters - Franco Villa Edits - Zac DeBoard Diaclone designs - Benjamin Galley

deviantART | Seibertron | TFW2005 | BotTalk

Later revised and annotated for Transformers: The Lost Seasons

wada sez: The first of three strips written to bring a Transformers Animated character into Sunbow continuity; I've bumped up the other two, which were originally posted not long after, for a better reading experience. Bulkhead’s group here has a mixture of origins, as explained in the comments on deviantART, but includes a couple of Diaclone bots, who were slightly redesigned by Galley for the sake of variety. The blue bot is actually a Brazilian character, Camaro, who was renamed "Sprint" after Windcharger's preliminary name. In the final panel, the bots present are the main cast of Animated, and to cement the homage Ratchet is seen fixing his forehead chevron, a cheeky reference inserted by Choquecota. Bulkhead’s original design was done by Choquecota, and Osorio wrote the whole story based on it; later, Osorio would create a separate character model for Bulkhead along similar lines for The Lost Seasons, which was widely shared online and seems very likely to have inspired the later official release of the G1-style Legacy Bulkhead. See below for all of this relevant artwork.

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askvectorprime · 1 year

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Dear Vector Prime is there a universe where the Cynertronians in a alterante versiom of "The Decepticon Raider in King Arthur's Court" where they got sent to a world based on the Seven Deadly Sins anime.

How would the Autobots and Decepticons handle being in Britannia if such a universe exists here.

Dear Irredeemable Interested,

During the Decepticon's time-tossed journey to ancient Britain, a friar in service of Sir Wigend of Blackthorn took interest in their guest, and attempted to gauge if Starscream was also a Christian. Plucking up his courage, the friar explained that in Christendom, all men are tempted and preyed upon by seven deadly sins, and asked if it was the same in Starscream's kingdom.

Starscream replied "Only seven?" and laughed for several minutes, the sound of which was so hideous to the friar that he jumped into the castle moat to escape it. I don't blame him.

#ask vector prime #transformers #maccadam #sunbow transformers #sir wigend of blackthorn #starscream

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virovac · 2 years

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Slamdance, Grandslam and Raindance should be in more G1 sunbow-inspired fanfics

He never got into Sunbow cartoon but, they would bounce off so well as uncle figures to the Protectobots and Aerialbots.

We got two incredibly ancient transformers here, probably predating the Autobots and Decepticons

We have a little pacifist tank who makes documentaries

decked out with mostly nonleath weapons [ 4 repulsor ray generators and a shell-cannon that mostly shoots smoke-shells ] except for two little non-accessory cannons never mentioned in fiction, so could easily hold some terrible power

Raindance the aerial ace turned photography enthusiast

And they combine together into a little guy

And that little guy they combine into is a blank slate! With only a profile given by Dreamwave MTME that makes them a reporter.

But in actuality:

: a type of dance (as to punk rock) in which leaping dancers collide against each other.

So can have fun there!

They may be so old they may come from a time when war-models weren’t meant to be sentient or considered people. How would they feel about the Decepticons claiming to be inheritors of their legacy?

And the Aerialbots while probably not respecting Grandslam, well I think Raindance would set them straight.

I could imagine them not even having names only serial numbers at first, getting names on Earth.

#transformers #slamdance #sunbow transformers

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arceespinkgun · 18 days

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The newest TF Skybound issue #7 gave me so much I wanted to see!!! Spoilers under the cut:

Elita-1 being a badass in action on Cybertron, and with Kup?! Arcee observing Carly's trauma and seeing herself in her? Jazz getting to express complex emotions and have friends finally after having such a diminished role for ages? All of this is great! The characterization has been really strong. And it's cool to see Soundwave as a Decepticon leader again since like the Marvel comics. Even there, he never openly challenged leadership in that way.

#transformers skybound #spoilers #my analysis #I like how this is fleshing out some dynamics and characters that are specifically from the Sunbow cartoon

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hasbr0mniverse · 8 months

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Tooniversary Month! This day The Transformers Season 3 was released

#hasbro #transformers #sunbow

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sunbowmarvelarchive · 6 months

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With my freelance writing work drying up, I'm afraid I must ask for help with keeping a roof over my head.

#gofundme #marvel #sunbow #transformers #storyboard #script #g1 #mlp

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tallus76-photography · 11 months

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Transformers - The Ultimate Doom_ Outta gas but not outta luck

#transformers #the ultimate doom #bumblebee #sunbow

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askarcanamagnus · 10 months

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Arcana Magnus: for our first post, we thought we'd get some help from the Earth we post on! Transformers media in your world is to sell toys after all (aside from people wanting to tell a story) and we thought some the customs in this photo would help set the tone even though talking via toys won't usually happen (and well, the unofficial Ask Vector Prime 2 has done digibashes paired with prose storytelling, so not new ground really). Please feel free to send us asks, even for things canon hasn't answered! :3

We're talking about canon here besides touching on those two. Here's the alt text/dialogue so people can read it this way, its a bit lengthy because of the amount of dialogue:

Alt text: A photo of transforming toys on a windowsill, with a trans flag for the background flooring, and a dark blue / purple night-time cardboard backdrop of a scifi city of cybertronian inspiration. The figures are engaged in combat and talking:

Titan Returns Arcee has her pistols out and is firing one into Siege Ion Storm's chest point blank, which has a blast effect there representing the impact, with a KABLAM orange-pink sound description above. TR Arcee is looking at Legends Arcee and saying: "So, you used to have a human body and then because you wanted to be a transformer from seeing the toys you became one? That’s so cool. I’m both a gal from Cybertron and binary bonded with a human who’s a dear friend of mine at this point- and our writing has now and my design is inspired from our trans iterations."

Ion Storm: "GAH- yeah your toy is cool as hell, it’s nice that things came full circle and car TTRPG Arcee can use her car hood as a shield.

Legends Arcee meanwhile stands on top of a collapsing Beast Hunters Shockwave, cutting his cannon in twain with a sword while stabbing Shockwave through his mono-optic face with her other sword: "Indeed! And yeah, my writing isn’t too great and I’m sexualized in a way that isn’t very tasteful or about me having agency in that regard, but as a concept me becoming a bot is fantastic, it’s a sentiment that resonates with the nonhuman community particularly human-bodied robot folk. Hopefully I’ll get better writing in a new iteration someday…"

Her attacks have similarly pink-orange sound effects of CLANG and CRUNCH.

Shockwave: Urk- I would hope for more logic… bleh

Behind her, Studio Series 86 Arcee is kneeling, with her pistol on her thigh, and Generations Selects Galvatron's fusion cannon held over her shoulder, firing it with blast effects into staggered Kingdom Cyclonus's shoulder and a SKWOMP sound effect: "Funny that we’re talking about this, besides my binary bond with Daniel, I did have a synthoid human body briefly, though I didn’t sign up for that. I think I wore overalls pretty well and certainly have a better understanding from my binary bond that was voluntary."

Nearby, a T30 Arcee painted in trans and lesbian flag patterns and guns on her backstacks has beheaded a falling T30 Jhiaxus with her sword. Jhiaxus's neck socket has a blast effect exploding upwards like pressured blood/fuel. T30 Arcee is looking at an Arcee customized from Legacy Elita-1 to resemble IDW1 Arcee, and T30 Arcee's speech bubble says: "Hmm, I mean, Transformers has always danced around that with the ‘transformers are humans in robot bodies with alien context’ concept in terms of writing- the toy design two of you are retooled from, me minus my custom pride flag paint job, though, definitely hits that sexualization thing. My concept design was going to be the basis for IDW1 Arcee over there in 4th reformat with a surgery that she was happy with as part of her gender journey, but the comics were so ahead from schedule that there wasn’t much of me to go on. Thankfully the artist wanted to keep in line with the comic aesthetic, so she looks different."

The IDW1 Arcee custom, erstwhile, who has cut into Jhiaxus's wing with her flaming orange blade with a pink and cyan FWOOSH sound and a fiery blast effect on top of her blade, is glancing at Legacy Arcee, and saying: "Yeah, that loops back around to the basis of Titan Returns Arcee, although I’m not sure that’s why she’s a Blurr retool. I mean, I feel like a Legacy Elita retool to Arcee with swords is fairly obvious route to go and it seems there are other people who think that, given the robust look I have from 2014-2018 (and that’s not even counting how other Arcee iterations drawn in Transformers vs. GIJOE, or IDW2, or Transformers vs. Terminator). I dunno, there’s something to be said for how root designs that look ‘overly human’ can work, my second reformat is in that category and outside of one cover with Galvatron that hasn’t aged well it’s not really focused on, which I think is interesting in retrospect even though it wasn’t intentional for a trans narrative. But yeah it is funny to see you on covers sometimes given the difference."

Legacy Arcee, who unlike her pink car bot companions, is a blue motorcycle, is in point blank contact with an unlicensed toy based on Airachnid (APC Night Countess), while Arcee's forearm blades are out, and she has 3D print blasters pointed at Airachnid's chest and head, taking a headshot with a blast effect over Airachnid's face, and Arcee is saying: "It’s still absurd to me that the only appearance of my Legacy form in canon media outside of toy stuff is me in a leotard or a swimsuit. Clothing is cool and all but am I hiding, and if it’s for fun why aren’t any of the guys doing the same thing too? I’m more partial to the fact that most of the time we are all basically walking around nude save for a few of us, and those who do wear clothes don’t do so on a basis of being a gal. I would much rather take being curvy with metal boobs while living sweetly and ferociously."

Airachnid: "You- guess fanfic and art will do…"

End Alt text.

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transformers-mosaic · 3 months

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Transformers: Mosaic #580 - "Prime Factors - Part One"

Originally posted on February 14th, 2011

Story, Colours - John-Paul Bove Art - Ryan Button

deviantART | Seibertron | TFW2005 | BotTalk

wada sez: This is the first of a mirrored pair of strips by Bove, serving to establish that when Optimus Primal took on Prime’s spark in Earth’s prehistoric past, there was some degree of interplay between their memories; Optimus Prime’s iconic ironic line from The Transformers: The Movie is thus made literal, as he knows the outcome of the battle is predetermined. On deviantART, Bove remarked: “I always thought it was a strange thing to say unless you KNEW that one of you wouldn't be coming back. After all, he's fought Megatron many times before and they both left standing at the end. Now we know why... ;)” Bove would explain the mechanics of this in detail on Seibertron: “Just to explain, the idea is that Prime has had these visions since waking up on Earth for the first time but that it is only now that he's able to start seeing the shape of what's coming rather than just a feeling, which is why he says "Then it hits me" at the point he does.” He further clarified that Prime was not remembering his own death firsthand, but rather has Primal’s knowledge of Cybertronian history: “Well Primal would know that Prime died, as BW characters come from a time at least 300 years after G1 and would certainly know the circumstances of it. It's more the idea that a fragment of Primal's knowledge stayed behind, in the same way that the accumulated wisdom and knowledge of previous leaders is supposed to stay within th [sic] Matrix. That may not have been enough for Prime to have crystal clear knowledge of the future but certainly would have enough to have premonitions and a sense of deja vu about the circumstances.” To one reader who pointed out that knowledge of Earth had been deliberately censored by the time of the Maximals and Predacons, Bove said: “I don't think that was the case but I'm happy to be corrected. The presence of the Matrix (and references to Unicron) implies the events of the Movie would be canon in BW continuity. Black Arachnia also mentions that Starscream was killed by Galvatron, so again the events of the Movie at least were known. BW Megatron does try to kill G1 Prime so that the Autobots never win the war that leads to the BW status quo. If the events on Earth had not mattered or the information lost then Prime would not have been important to the outcome of the war on Cybertron and not worth Megatron's efforts.” Bove’s grasp on Beast Wars continuity has always been, well, shaky. Again, I find myself baffled by the behind-the-scenes process of the Mosaic project, as Bove remarked that this story had been written “about 3-4 years ago” by the time of its publication! Clean colors below.

#Transformers #Transformers Mosaic #Maccadam #Sunbow Transformers #Beast Wars #The Transformers: The Movie #John-Paul Bove #Ryan Button #official creator #Optimus Prime #Optimus Primal #Thrust #Soundwave #Blitzwing #Ramjet #Megatron

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thatdoodlebug · 9 months

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anyone know what happened to @destrondandy and starry (i can't honestly remember their blog, it changed a few times) that were part of gi joe fandom (mostly sunbow). they just disappeared. and on discord too. i know that life happens but i would like to know they're at least ok. if anyone knows anything please drop a message~

#gi joe #gi joe fandom #cobra commander #sunbow #80s cartoons #transformers #starry #destrondandy

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pluralsword · 1 year

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thinking about how aesthetically TR already did partner Daniel Witwicky with IDW1 inspired Arcee because of the helm shape TR Arcee has, before we did that in fanfic, & afterwards (almost certainly having done so without knowing about our trans Daniel and Arcee fanfic) JRO did so for uk postage stamps+

ID 1 of 2: Three Arcee toys on a window sill. Specifically, an IDW1 custom of Arcee (from Legacy Elita) holding Leinad (Daniel Witwicky) in head mode showing Arcee's face, and touching the back of that head is Studio 86 Arcee. TR Arcee has helm guard ridges on her mid and lower cheeks, just like the IDW Arcee custom, whereas S86 Arcee does not. End ID.

ID 2 of 2: Visual art Arcee heads: from EXRID of IDW1 (art by Alex Milne and Josh Perez), a stock photo of the TR Arcee from TFwiki, a zoom in on the box art of TR Arcee, and screencap of Arcee's head from Transformers the Movie. The TR heads do have some differences from both the comic and cartoon heads: the audials are smaller (likely due to the TR headmaster gimmick) and are pink (like her early EXRID helm), and the head crest has an additional smaller crest on top with a blue biolight at the front (similar to her early Phase 1 helm). End ID.

Combined with the fact e.g. original Arcee bio describes her as a ferocious warrior especially when fighting people who threatened her loved ones, and well, if you watched Sunbow you do see some of that, a lot of this was not new ground for EXRID to tread, just a different journey. So TR Arcee being an amalgam of the trans gal we know in the comics & G1 Arcee (and TR Blurr retool no less, across gender retools are one of our favorite things about transformers) is just bringing together two overlapping aspects of Arcee the postage stamp bio did the same.

What the stamp bio did not do in having Arcee & Daniel being friends was have Daniel go on a gender journey as a result of that lmao, which we did write , after talking with another fanfic writer who was writing how Daniel would be inspired by her & the blurring from their binary bond.

Now, we aren't actually the first person to post a trans Daniel Witwicky story on Ao3. Somebody beat us to that by nearly nine years, back in 2013 (we definitely don't mind! the more people who write trans Daniel the better) but it's smut so we won't link it here lmao.

But if you want to read the fic that led us to write how Daniel & Arcee's gender journeys could intertwine, or want to read a good G1 fic go read Showdown at Sherman Dam , the fic we did partially because of that one is Day of Multiflame .

More & more we feel that G1 & IDW1&2 'Cees aren't drastically different chars, just different things happened to them & have some personality differences. But the ethical & martial core of her is there. Earthspark Arcee reflects this. Don't believe us, then read Best of Arcee. it's all there. That comic has one of the better moments for Arcee in the old G1 comics, she speaks to her pacifist ethos to keep Hot Rod from losing it. Sound familiar to Arcee advising Optimus in IDW1? There are some big differences but that's for another time and frankly we’d rather save that for a larger thing about Arcee that would also talk about Aligned, the movie comics, Animated, all of it that we have the spoons to dig into

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arceespinkgun · 4 months

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A Gift for Jazz Fans: "The Mission"

The annuals that are part of the Marvel UK comics continuity have some great stories in them. Somehow, I hadn't known one of those was "The Mission" by Jamie Delano from the 1986 annual until very recently. I've always wanted to see more of Jazz's inner thoughts and feelings explored, and this story delivered on that and then some. It provides really interesting answers to the question, "Underneath it all, who is Jazz, at his core?" (Plus, it gives Hoist a rare chance to show off his skills without being eclipsed by others.) It provides complex characterization of Jazz and his personality that would be great to see return in newer media.

Head below the cut to read on! I've provided the full story and the illustrations.

The Mission

It was a monochrome world. The onset of the Alaskan winter had clapped the wild land in irons, squeezing the colour from the mountains and the sky. The black-toothed peaks chewed at grey clouds, swollen with snow.

Jazz, the heroic Autobot, was undismayed by the cold. He found the gigantic landscape exhilarating in its scale, its grandeur more a challenge than a threat. Although, in his current mode — disguised as a Porsche — the freezing conditions caused him some minor problems with traction.

He hugged himself closer to the frosted surface of the Alaskan highway and accelerated northwards. The road tested him as it writhed its way across the land. Jazz chased it, with the thrill of perfect control pulsing through him. He slid — broadsiding through the curves — and climbed through the howling gears, arrowing into the straights, cutting through an occasional brief convoy of toiling trucks, like a barracuda through a shoal of jellyfish. The stillness of the massive land invited speed — its silence, noise.

This landscape dwarfed even the Autobots, he thought. How it must oppress and torment the humans who came here! Their design allowed them only marginal resistance to temperature fluctuations. Thankfully, in this, as in most other aspects, Autobots were far superior machinery.

Jazz considered the force which drove him at such speed towards the heart of the Yukon region on the boundary between Canada and Alaska — the perpetual, Earthbound war with the Decepticons. This mission, on which he had embarked with his comrade, Hoist, should have been a straightforward one. A simple observation of the Constructicons, perhaps rounded off with a bit of simple sabotage for good measure. However, something had gone drastically wrong.

Jazz squeezed a few extra revolutions from his motor. He needed to hurry. There were still one hundred miles to cover before he must leave the road, then the same distance again across difficult terrain, to bring him to the origin point of Hoist’s signal. He had not realised that their line of communications had become so extended. It was bad tactics. With enemies as dangerous as the Decepticons, mistakes could be costly.

ACTION AT LAST!

Despite a sense of foreboding, Jazz could not deny that the action was doing him good. He had been idle for too long. For three weeks he had been locked in a freight container. First there was a week, en route from San Francisco to Skagway by sea — a journey which had stressed his balance circuits severely. Then, a further two weeks in a Skagway freight yard, with all systems shut down to conserve fuel. Listening watch only, had been the orders — it had seemed like eternity. When, finally, the brief signal had found his eager antennae and tripped his systems into life, it had not been the one he was expecting. It had been a single brief transmission on the Auto- bots’ Urgent Distress Frequency.

Hoist had done good work as a scout in the past, Jazz had thought as, gunning his powerful motor fiercely, he had cracked out of the steel container as if it were tinfoil; but he lacked flair. He was too methodical for fieldwork. He was a workshop machine, maintainance was his strength. However, with the Decepticons fighting on so many different fronts, the Autobot warriors were spread too thinly. All hands were pressed into service; constant opposition to the enemy was vital. Now Hoist had got himself into trouble. Jazz hoped that his comrade had not tangled with the Constructicons. They would turn him into scrap and use him to make rivets.

Like a snarling bullet, the Porsche ripped into the sub-arctic night. In his riotous wake, snakes of powdered snow writhed, hissing from the road.

SHREWD TACTICS

Until he had stepped into the hole, Hoist had been well satisfied with progress of his mission. It had been no easy task to locate and observe the enemy unit in such haphazard and gargantuan geography as that of the Yukon territory. A city could be lost and never found here. But by shrewd tactics and thoroughly practised techniques he had accomplished his task.

He had tracked the Constructicons and for three days he had waited motionless in the dark, cold, shadows of the mountainside. Only his powerful full-spectrum scanners operated in this time — locked onto the activity of the Constructicons, as constantly they mined and tunnelled their way into the permanently deep-frozen silt of the river plain below.

Whether it was a tactical base they were building, or a mine for some kind of mineral fuel source, Hoist had been unable to ascertain from long range. So, as the Constructicons had now become invisible to his sensory receptors — other than as a clatter of indistinguishable industry beneath the surface of the ice- bound ground — he had deduced that the risk involved in a covert, close-quarters reconnaissance of the target was acceptable.

He had raised his massive bulk to a vertical position. Ice which had lacquered him burst away from his flexing joints in small crystal explosions as the Autobot manoeuvred his frosted form down towards the terraces of the frozen flood-plain.

Conscious of his high sensor profile in this open country, Hoist had kept low, hugging the occasional rocky shoulder with which the mountains nudged the ice-skirted streams towards the river. In this fashion he had approached to within half-a-mile of the enemy’s subterranean work site.

DISASTER!

Then, crossing a low ridge-top with all sensors locked firmly onto the target — alert for the sudden, searing light of a laser — waiting for the rush and metal- tearing fire of a missile — Hoist had stepped forward into nothing. Sudden, split-second, bottomless, unknown, no- thing.

With a gyro-wrenching jolt the drop had stopped short and Hoist was trapped, suspended, held by the shoulders in the impossible grip of the earth frozen hard as granite. His huge legs had flailed at emptiness in wild, futile, energy expenditure and his torso had flexed and strained against the immovable walls of the pit into which he had fallen. Then came realisation that a moment of carelessness had brought potential dis- aster on him and his mission.

He had fallen into some kind of vertical shaft — not a natural feature — and was now wedged with his arms trapped uselessly by his sides. Worst of all, his head and the armoured dome of his shoulders were sticking up above the surface of the ground, like a beacon for the first Constructicon who surfaced for a routine defensive scan. He had decided to risk a brief emergency trans- mission, calculating that even if the enemy intercepted his signal and destroyed him, Jazz would still have the target’s location.

As the frozen hours passed, there was wind. With the wind came snow — swarming out of the darkness liked crazed bees. The Autobot scout waited. He could do nothing else.

ROUGH TERRAIN

After leaving the Alaskan highway and enduring twenty miles of cratered dirt road, until the risk of mechanical damage began to outweigh the benefits of speed, Jazz reluctantly abandoned his Porsche mode and transformed.

There had followed eight hours of slow, zig-zag navigation through a savage landscape. He had climbed boulder-strewn mountain passes and ploughed, stumbling through drifted fields of snow. The wind drove constant flights

of ice needles which scoured him abrasively, periodically clogging his sensory receptors, blinding and disorientating him as he struggled to make his way towards the source of the distress signal.

His sensors determined the location of the Constructicons easily enough. Briefly he considered a lightning, maximum fire-power strike on the concealed installation. But however tempting the prospect of entombing the Constructicons in a crypt of their own manufacture, Jazz's priority had had to be to ascertain the fate of Hoist. He thought he detected traces of Autobot alloys — but the geometry of the image was wrong.

Apprehensively he went to full scanner power and focused. Out on the snow carpet he now distinguished the head and shoulders of his comrade. The Constructicons must have destroyed him and left this wreckage as a warning — or a trap. Fascination and dread drew Jazz down onto his belly and he furrowed forward through the snow, armour grinding on the hard ground beneath. His weaponry was ranged and armed.

As he drew near to the remains of Hoist, he was fine-tuned to a hair trigger of violent reaction, expecting a Constructicon ambush at any second. So, when suddenly his comrade’s head swivelled towards him and spoke, it was unfortunate, but not surprising, that Jazz reacted in the way that he did.

Hoist had remained completely still as the snow hurried down around him, covering his body and the pit. Once more he had shut down all systems except for perception, to minimise the chances of detection by the enemy and to conserve fuel. When, eventually, he sensed movement behind him he knew that it must be Jazz. Gratefully he turned to greet him.

RELEASED

His comrade’s action was spontaneous — and ultimately disastrous. At the sound of Hoist’s voice, Jazz flipped over in a blur of motion. He snapped into an attack position and Hoist saw the Autobot’s photon-rifle lurch as it discharged a concentrated gem of solar power into the Constructicon position.

“Why?” Hoist asked, bewildered. “Why did you do that?”

As soon as he had fired, Jazz realised he had responded more like an untested junior warrior on his first mission, than a hardened Autobot commander. He had jeopardised their position in the extreme. He recovered his equilibrium and sprang into action. Straddling the pit, he bent and thrust down his arms to find firm purchase on the smooth, hard armour of the trapped Autobot. Enormous feet chewed into the frozen ground as machinery stressed and levered. Jazz increased power to maximum and, slowly, the dead weight of Hoist began to lift from the pit.

“Trust you to come all this way without mishap and then to fall into a gold-mine at the last minute!”

“Gold-mine?” replied Hoist, as his shoulder armour screamed in friction with the rock-hard earth.

“Do you mean that humans would endure these conditions to dig a useless metal from the ground…”

“They have no logic.”

Jazz would have liked to explain what he had learned of the Klondike gold rushes. How hundreds of thousands of men and women forced their way into the wilderness — enduring misery upon misery, deprivation upon deprivation — in order to win riches and respect. But he knew that Hoist would not understand — and the time was inappropriate.

With an ungainly metallic slithering, the bulk of the freed Autobot tangled him into the snow. Jazz extricated him- self and was about to suggest that they made a hasty strategic withdrawal when he was distracted by a sudden prickle of light from the enemy position. He barely had time to acknowledge this as laser fire, when the world turned red and then disappeared in a flare of purest sterile white.

Clumsily rolling into an operating position, Hoist saw and felt the vicious lines of laser light cutting the air and boiling into the snow around them. Instinctively, he returned fire, his arm launching a covering pattern of heat-seeking missiles which charged, vapour trailing behind them, into the enemy emplacement. He looked for Jazz — and was dismayed to see him stationary and fully exposed to the Constructicon fire. Hoist’s expert eye scanned for damage — and found it. Jazz had been hit in the side of the head.

The armoured steel, still glowing faintly, was puckered around a small, neat puncture. Hoist knew that the Autobot’s sensory and logistical circuits — a complex honeycomb of micro-circuitry — must have been powdered by this hot-shot.

The Constructicons were fanning out, trying to surround them before moving in to finish them off. Hoist had to get both of them into concealment, or a strong defensive position — or they were doomed.

Fortunately, although Jazz's logic circuits had been re-structured by the laser, his motor mechanisms were unimpaired. Bellowing wildly, Hoist bundled him frantically towards the sheltering slopes of the dark mountainside. With fortune and the inaccuracy of the Constructicon marksmen, they might just make it before they were overrun…

CONFUSION

Abruptly, he was aware that he had been moving for a long time.

Who was he? Where was he? Why was he?

What was that thunderous voice that roared in his head? Why was he being pushed, slipping, sliding, crashing and reeling through the jagged black and soft white of this place?

On a ridgetop, he stopped and turned to consider his tormentor, a powerful machine of destruction and violence. He struggled to frame intelligible sounds, but a siren wail that seemed to mimic the wind was all that burst from him. Simultaneously, a splash of fire blossomed beside them, throwing out shoots of rock and ice which rattled and punched at his metallic hide.

He was still listening to the complex percussion of the falling debris, when the violent machine swung a mighty arm and struck him a ringing blow. Surprised and unbalanced, he toppled and fell, limbs scrabbling wildly for grip where there was none. Then he was moving, accelerating downwards in a reckless exhilaration of speed, cleaving up plumes of soft, white powder. He was out of control.

“Move! Move!” Hoist roared in frustration. His damaged comrade stood, vacant, as if engrossed in some strange entertainment. Hoist shoved him again, as he had been shoving him for hour after mountainous hour, mile after ice-bound mile, trying desperately to keep ahead of the pursuing Constructicons.

He watched for a second as Jazz tobogganed down the ice-slope and then, spurred on by the laser fire that pierced and shattered the black rock around him, he too launched himself on the armour-rattling descent.

If Hoist’s navigation was correct they should have cleared the high peaks now and should soon be able to make the tree-line and find forest cover. Fifteen hundred feet below, he came abruptly to rest at the foot of the ice-slope. He shook free the snow that had compacted itself in his scanners and looked for his hapless companion. Locating him, Hoist groaned inwardly — more aberrant behaviour!

The second-in-command of the Autobot Warriors, right-hand of the great Optimus Prime, was sitting atop a large snow-clad boulder — his attention rapt upon six balls of compacted snow, which he manipulated skillfully from hand to hand, managing to keep them all airborne and mobile.

Juggling. In the midst of a potential battle-zone, he was juggling! Still, at least there was nothing wrong with his co-ordination, thought Hoist.

COVER AT LAST

After several miles of difficult descent through a boulder-choked gully, they entered the forest.

Hoist felt marginally more secure as they moved between the trees. They would help screen them from the Constructicon scanners. His damaged companion, Jazz, seemed to be inhabiting a different world. He had lost all awareness of their mission and the danger they were in. He sauntered along, stopping to investigate every feature of their environment in minute detail, as if each held the secrets of the Universe. It was highly tedious and Hoist wasted critical fuel in constantly prodding the Autobot onwards.

Hoist had calculated that their fuel reserves would not take them beyond reach of the enemy. They were going to need transport. A vague plan was forming in his logic centres. He knew that, mathematically, its chances of success were slim; but the only alternative was ultimate destruction at the hands of the Constructicons. They must press on to the south. They needed a river.

Simultaneous with the awareness of a distant crashing and shattering of timber which assailed his senses, Hoist realised that Jazz was no longer with him. Desperately he scanned, trying to locate his comrade’s metal bulk amongst the distracting ghost images thrown back by the trees.

Jazz sat as if sculpted from the landscape. His attention was wholly focused on a stunningly perfect piece of machinery. Four delicately precise limbs supported a powerful, lithe, brown torso. The head, set atop a strong flexible neck, bore strange, spreading antennae with which, for some mysterious purpose, it scraped at the column of one of the tall, static machines.

Suddenly, the entrancing machine froze. Briefly, it cocked its head to one side and then was gone. Disappointed, he turned to find the Violent One shouldering his way through the densely packed columns, like an avalanche.

DEVASTATOR!

Hoist knew from the scale and volume of the fast closing pursuit that the Constructicons must have combined into their awesome composite form — Devastator. Frantically he bullied the unwilling Jazz through the clawing forest. He was urged both by the horrendous tearing of timber, as the gargantuan Decepticon machine levelled all before it in its single-minded desire to annihilate them — and by the fact that he sensed the presence of water ahead.

In seconds they broke from the trees and stood on the rocky banks of a river.

Instantly Hoist was assailed by doubt. A hundred yards upstream the towering, curved, concrete wall of what he recognised to be a hydro-electric dam spanned the river gorge. What should have been a violent torrent was reduced to a sedate surge. Surely the water would not have depth or power enough for his purpose. Nevertheless, with Devastator’s ruthless destruction of the forest rending the mountain air, he knew that defeat could not be contemplated. They were Heroic Autobots — the conflict would continue to the end.

Quickly Hoist selected four tall, thick pine trees. With a series of rapid, powerful movements, he felled and stripped them of branches. Then he manipulated them into the water. It was barely deep enough to float them.

Hoist sensed that the end was near. They would have to stand and fight.

Fifty yards downstream, the mighty form of Devastator ripped, splintering out of the forest. Remorselessly it scanned the river gorge for its enemies. Hoist primed his weaponry and looked for Jazz. In full view, the damaged Autobot was standing, facing the soaring wall of the dam, calmly scanning it from top to bottom and from side to side.

CAUGHT IN THE OPEN

Ugly, he thought to himself. This wall was ugly. It should not be here, obstructing the flow of the water. The water was a part of the big machine that was this planet. The planet was part of the solar system and that was part… The wall was wrong.

Sounds from behind turned him. Two things were happening. The Violent One who harrassed him constantly, was approaching at speed and beyond him a gigantic machine straddled the river, crushing boulders to powder under its enormous weight. This giant was pointing at him.

Then the Violent One cannoned into him, slamming him back into the ugly concrete of the wall. At the same moment, from the pointing arm of the giant machine, a light flared out, like the light of suns. Energy crackled past him and solid heat chewed into the wall, concentrating on a patch which suddenly spurted water and steam in a glittering power-jet.

Then the Violent One was dragging him again. The pulsing light danced from the giant's arm several more times but it did not touch them. The Violent One reached suddenly for his head — and then there was nothing at all.

FINAL CHANCE

There was a chance, one final, desperate chance. Hoist saw it and took it. The ten-thousand degree pulse of solar energy which Devastator had launched at Jazz had punched a hole straight through the dam. Hoist saw cracks, beginning as filaments but rapidly spreading into a web which crumbled from its centre. He knew that he had but scant seconds.

He dragged Jazz to where the tree trunks bobbed and lurched, side by side on the slowly rising river. With the quick, deft skill of an expert mechanic, he shut down Jazz’s systems completely. He just had time to lay the disabled Autobot on the loose raft and throw himself on top — clenching and binding the tree trunks together with his own huge strength — before the dam disintegrated.

A mighty, surging roar of water boiled into the river gorge and plucked up the cumbersome vessel like a feather, spinning and tossing it forward in a wild freedom of escape.

An image, which would remain in Hoist’s memory banks forever, swept by. In panic and alarm, the Constructicons had disassembled from their Devastator mode as the churning wall of water spewed over them. In a split second they were submerged — bowled and scraped along the bottom of the gorge like pebbles — whilst the Autobots’ raft surfed over them on wild wings of water.

The mission was over, thought Hoist. They had failed, but not completely. The war would continue and he and his comrade Jazz, repaired by Ratchet, would fight the Decepticons again.

Two days later, at a back-road gas- station, just south of the Canadian border, a sleepy pump-jockey was surprised to see a towtruck towing a battered Porsche that looked as if it had been in the wars. He was more surprised, as he watched them disappear down the road, to realise that it had no driver. By Jamie Delano.

#Jazz #Hoist #transformers g1 #transformers marvel #I adore how Jazz zones out on a boulder and juggles snowballs and also marvels at the beauty of nature #And between this and the snow-bot moment from the Sunbow cartoon I will always associate Jazz with snow #Constructicons #Devastator

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hasbr0mniverse · 1 year

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The Hasbroverse 80’s Afternoon - The Transformers - Season 03 Episode 10 - Fight or Flee