IDW - Rom Annual 2017

Title: The Origin of Rom: Cold Fire

Plot and Script by: Christos Gage & Chris Ryall

Pencils by: David Messina

Inks by: Michele Pasta

Colours by: Alessandra Alexakis & David Messina

Letters by: Shawn Lee

Editorial Assist by: David Mariotte

Publisher: Ted Adams

Plot

Strange meteors crash through the energy shield around the peaceful planet of Elonia. The K'atsema family start to examine the rocks, but the mothers contact Rom, their son, to help them move the rocks due to their weight and his knowledge on geology. Rom's brother Reyn manages to pick up one of the smaller rocks and comments that it's started to glow to his mothers...

Rom returns home with his friends, Livia and Fy-Laa, where they are curious about how the meteors got through the planet's shield, when suddenly Rom's home explodes, leaving them shocked.

Later, the Solstar Order have arrived at the explosion site, to investigate the incident, when one of their investigators locate the severely burned and injured body of one of Rom's mothers!

The next day, Rom and his friends have arrived at the Solstar Academy's Medical Facility, where Rom tries to find out who attacked his family, and several other settlements, pointing out how suspicious it is that all the meteors and explosions hit settled areas only. Commander Diavod dismisses this, trying to hide the threats of the outside universe from Elonia, but is soon interrupted when the injured people all start to wake up, attack the scientists, and are revealed to be Dire Wraiths, including Rom's mother!

The Wraiths attack the observation lounge, where Rom and the others are located. Rom's "mother" tries to trick him into lowering his guard, so she can kill him too, but Rom takes Diavod's Neutralizer, and shoots her, albeit with not enough power to kill the Wraith. Soon, more members of the Order arrive, and the Wraiths escape through a newly created hole in the wall.

Later, Rom and his friends arrive at the Solstar Order Command Center, where they join the Order, so they can help stop the Wraiths from hurting anyone else. The command teams are unsure, since Elonians are generally weaker than most other species, but allow them, since they need numbers more than brute force now.

Rom and the others go through their training, and in this time Rom and Livia start a romantic relationship. Before long they graduate from the training program and are assigned to guard the mines at the Blue Mountains, which is right near where Rom used to live with his family. Their mission is to see if the Wraiths are using it as their local base of operations, but Rom suspects it's just busy-work for them, as they aren't respected yet.

The team of Rom, Livia and Fy-laa settle down for the night, at the mouth of the mines, when they are suddenly attacked by the Dire Wraiths! The newly graduated Order members are heavily outmatched by the evil aliens, which leads Rom to using his geological and local knowledge to his advantage, and blasts a hole in the ground, allowing the Order team to fall into the abandoned mine, where their fall is cushioned by the water, which flooded the place, causing it to be abandoned originally.

The team try to hide from the Wraiths, but they are able to sense them. Rom tries to use his Neutralizer on them, but it's out of energy, forcing him to throw it aside. The Wraiths continue to advance on him, so he grabs a nearby rock out of desperation, to use it as a bludgeoning weapon, but the ore, which the Wraiths are afraid of, starts to turn into a liquid substance, and begins covering and merging with Rom, as painfully as possible. Rom reaches for the Neutralizer out of habit, and it is also merged with Rom.

Rom stands up, and is revealed to be fully covered in a silver suit of armour, and manages to shoot a Neutralizer beam from his hand, killing one of the Wraiths with ease, much to everyone's shock.

Rom soon convinces his friends to use the ore on themselves, which they do, resulting in them also being upgraded with their armours allowing them to finish off the rest of the present Dire Wraiths, including the one that took Rom's mother's body

Later, the Solstar Order pick up the trio, and collect up as much of the ore as they can. Some time later, the ore and armour has been analysed, and reveals that they are now perfect Dire Wraith killing machines, but it cannot be removed, which leads the command team to plan to use the ore on their troops, to fight the Wraiths off, as the KNIGHTS of the Solstar Order.

The team goes for further testing and training with their armour, but Rom excuses himself, so he can return to his old home so he can memorialize his family, and swears revenge for them.

Following this pledge, he flies off to return to the rest of the Knights....

Characters

Solstar Order

Imperiator Carax

Orphion

Diavod

Rom K'atsema

Livia

Fy-laa

Prim

Butin

Whrrr

Maur

Q'b

"Mask-wearing Bear"

"Purple Blob"

Other Solstar Order Troops

Solstar Order Medical Facility Staff

Other Elonian

Benna K'atsema Killed in Meteor explosion, Possibly possessed by Dire Wraith

Shah K'atsema Killed in Meteor explosion, Possibly possessed by Dire Wraith

Reyn K'atsema Killed in Meteor explosion

Elonian Newscaster (Hologram Only)

Dire Wraith

High Priest Killed by Livia

"Mother" Wraith Killed by Rom

Other Dire Wraiths Killed by Rom and Livia

Invading Dire Wraith Army

Other

Loros (Mentioned)

Notes

• This story is set about 200 years ago, meaning it is set around the 1800's
• Rom has two mothers...it isn't clear which one is which though, but I'm guessing that Benna is the short-black haired one, and Shah is the other, since that's the order they were named in, and shown on panel here.
• The Solstar Order are confused over how the Dire Wraiths could inhabit inorganic meteors, this is later discovered in the modern era by Rom to be due to them blending their magic with other technology
• It's not clear if Livia is also Elonian, like Rom (just with a different skin tone), or another species altogether.
• The Dire Wraith High Priest in this issue seems to have a snake-like body, just like Orphion. He mentions that the Wraiths invaded his planet first, so maybe this is just one of the first victims?
• The strange ore that creates the Soltar Knight armour is unidentified here, but due to it's affinity with Cybertronian technology, as shown during Revolution, it's likely one of the Regenesis Ores created by Shockwave, or some derivative of them.
• Also regarding the ore, they encase organic beings with a new mechanical body, gives them in-built flight capabilities, in-built weapons, are self-healing and have extended life-spans? Is Rom a Go-Bot?
• The armour is revealed to be able to change shape based on the wielder's needs...I wonder if this will mean anything in the future issues?
• The stories of the Knights of the Solstar Order will continue properly in Rom  #11.
• On the last page the only Knight that is unidentified is the purple blob. The bear is also unnamed, but we at least saw him in this issue...unless he's Diavod, in which case...YIKES!