IDW - Monstrosity #2

Story by: Chris Metzen & Flint Dille

Art by: Livio Ramondelli

Letters by: Tom B. Long

Editor: John Barber

Plot

Optimus Prime and his team, including the observing Dai Atlas exit Sky Lynx and start battling the Decepticons. Elsewhere, the Dynobots have escaped the fight, but end up being cornered by Scorponok and some of the Decepticons.

Meanwhile, on Junkion Megatron and Pentius and wandering around when they reach the Corroded Shore, Pentius cautions Megatron on his stepping, but Megatron ignores him, and is attacked by a Sharkticon, who pulls him under the water.

Back on Cybertron Grimlock battles Scorponok, and pummels him, getting angrier the whole time and starts to go feral, Swoop and Slag try to calm down Grimlock, but he only calms down when Optimus arrives and shoots him, telling him to stand down. Optimus tells him that despite him being an Autobot, he's a danger, and a criminal right now, so he has to be arrested, rather than be able to leave the planet like he originally planned. Grimlock gets angry and decides to blow up the Mega-Refinery by pushing the Fusion-Regulator, killing himself and everyone around him, Optimus however manages to talk him down.

Scorponok however has other ideas and pushes the button himself.

Hours later, the Mega-Refinery has been destroyed and rescue teams are picking up the wounded, of course with this facility's destruction, the planet's last major Energon source has been destroyed. Optimus holds a funeral for the people lost during the destruction, and later Dai Atlas speaks with him about leaving the planet, as there's no recovery for the planet now, but Optimus refuses to abandon their home. Meanwhile at Kolkular Scorponok presents the dead Decepticon bodies to his team and has them scavange the dead for spare parts.

On Junkion, Megatron manages to defeat the Sharkticons and leaves the Acid Sea and Pentius comments on how Megatron's own world will look like this one day, and explains about how the people of Junkion were once beautiful and narcissistic, and also wasteful eventually wasting all their natural resources, and causing their planet to create a gravimetric pull that attracted the space debris, creating the wasteland that's left.

Megatron denies this will happen to his world, as he has a drive for dominance that the Junkions lacked

Grimlock wanders around the blast site at Toraxxis and can't find anyone, and wonders if he's still alive or not. At the same time, the Exodus begins, and all those who wish to begin leaving the planet, with Dai Atlas blaming Optimus, as an inept Prime, who has led the planet to this.

Meanwhile within the irradiated Toraxxis crater Jetfire's team are investigating the area when they find a cavern, inside they find some cave drawings, seeming to warn about something, when suddenly the ground collapses and they land near a lake of extremely pure Energon.

In Metroplex Optimus has called for Kup to come see him, as he's wondering about the Dynobots, and is confused about their actions - They helped in the battle against Megatron, but shortly later began thieving Energon, despite being decorated heroes.

In the Energon Caverns the team are investigating the lake of Energon when Ratchet falls in and turns briefly feral, attacking Perceptor, but recovers quickly, Perceptor realizes that it was the Energon, but before they can analyse it they're attacked by some creatures.

At Metroplex again, Optimus analyzes the Dynobot's data and discovers that in their last known mission they were attacked in some Subterranean Terror Bases, where something happened, and they began showing their feral forms, and one of their team members (Skar) was killed. Kup suggests after seeing this that the Dynobots should be put down, but Optimus thinks they may be soldiers worth saving after all.

The science team manage to fight off the monsters underground, and escape into a cavern that the monsters seem to be scared of etering. Jetfire wonders why this is, so he transforms and gets a better look, coming face to face with a sleeping Trypticon.

Characters

Autobot

Optimus Prime - Truck

Grimlock - Feral Beast

Swoop - Jet

Slag

Jetfire - Jet

Ratchet - Ambulance

Perceptor

Wheeljack

Metroplex - City/Ship

Kup - Pick-Up Truck

Sky Lynx 

Prowl - Car

Bumblebee - Car

Ironhide - Van

Ultra Magnus

Blaster

Dead Autobots (Holograms)

Sludge (Footage Only)

Snarl (Footage Only)

Zeta Prime (Mentioned) Dead

Decepticon

Megatron Exiled to Junkion

Scorponok

Starscream - Jet

Thundercracker - Jet

Soundwave

Blitzwing - Jet/Tank

Tankor - Large Jet (Mentioned)

Dead Decepticons Corpses left to rot and scavenged

Other

Dai Atlas

Pentius

Tryptcicon Inert

Sharkticons Destroyed by Megatron

Cyber-Morphic Predators

People of Iacon

Skar Killed in Battle (Footage Only)

Pre-Junkions (Flashback)

Nominus Prime (Mentioned)

Primal Vanguard (Mentioned)

Adaptus (Mentioned)

Knights of Cybertron (Mentioned)

Notes

• This is the collection of issue 4-6 of the digital versions of this series
• Sharkticons are native to Junkion it seems
• Grimlock (and the other Dynobots) are revealed properly here to have feral alternate modes, before they take on their Dino-modes in Spotlight: Shockwave, which seems to alter their minds too (like in the Prime series). They have their vehicle mode kibble though, so their transformations seem more like mutations really.
• The funerals shown here are similar in style (though larger scale) to Bumper and Fastback's one in Megatron Origin
• Junkion used to be a Cybertron-like world (maybe a colony, or just a second world with Transformers) and presumably wasn't always called Junkion either. It died when the Energon run out and it started attracting the debris of space into itself
• The Great Exodus is shown here, and those who leave don't return until "The Death of Optimus Prime", set in the present day
• The Cyber-Morphic Predators seen towards the pure Energon sort of resemble the Trans-Organics from the G1 cartoon
• Trypticon being found inert far beneath Cybertron implies that he was built long ago, and perhaps is something akin to a Metrotitan (of course we've seen already that Trypticon joins the Decepticons later on, but then again, he hasn't been seen in recent stories, only those set around the Thunderhead Pass incident)
• Scoponok being stabbed in the chest with a sword is similar to his fate in the Energon comic (though he survives it here of course)
• How did Optimus and the others survive the Mega-Refinery explosion?