IDW - Transformers (2019) #6

Title: Orion Pax: Free Fall

Written by: Brian Ruckley

Art by: Beth McGuire-Smith

Letters by: Tom B. Long

Editors: David Mariotte & Tom Waltz

Plot

Orion Pax comes to meet with Codexa, to try and speak with her about something he plans to do, but she, having become part of Cybertron, is having a hard time concentrating, but remembers Orion, but also Megatron, remembering that they were friends..

Orion remembers back to two megacycles earlier, following the war with the Threefold Spark, that he helped Megatron trying to recover a buried statue of their creator god, Primus, when a hover trailer loses control and almost bashes into them. Megatron controls the crash, whilst Orion keeps hold of Primus, and the two work together to keep it all together...

A long time later, the Winged Moon is completed, and Orion bumps into Megatron there, where Orion asks him why he didn't tell him that he was running for a senatorial position, especially for a controversial party like the Ascenticons. Megatron in turn questions Orion's allegiance to the Autobots, and they head into the Tether to go back to the surface. On the way down, Orion says that he is going to leave planet for a while to explore the colonies before taking Codexa's place as head archivist, which leads Megatron to manually turn off the elevator and leaves it, encouraging Orion to join him in the atmosphere.

The two admire the view of their homeworld from afar, and Megatron hads his friend a levitator, and leads him to join him in freefalling from the sky to Cybertron's surface.

Megatron's levitator works, but Orion's fails for him, and he falls to the surface, luckily landing in a lagoon, relatively unharmed. Megatron is happy and asks if Orion's spark is running faster and brighter from the fun, but Orion wonders if Megatron is a bit mad, which offends his old friend, and tells Orion to leave for his journey through the stars, as he'll be here, where the future will be built up...

Codexa finishes remembering about Megatron and Orion Pax, comparing Megatron to Exarchon, the one who led the Threefold Spark, which Orion doesn't want to believe. 

Orion asks for permission to do something that could get someone hurt, and could be seen as a small betrayal to others, to which Codexa remembers that Orion was always so formal, and never let himself be, and hid his true feelings...seemingly leading Orion to his decision....

Characters

Autobot

Orion Pax - Truck

Nominus Prime (Mentioned)

Ascenticon

Megatron - Treaded Vehicle

Termagax (Mentioned)

Other Cybertronian

Codexa Immersant with Cybertron

Winged Moon Construction Crew (Flashback Only)

Post War Repair Crews (Flashback Only)

Primus (Statue Only)

The Senate (Mentioned)

Constructicons (Mentioned)

Exarchon (Mentioned)

The Threefold Spark (Mentioned)

Notes

• This issue follows the end of issue 3 of the series, where Orion starts his conversation with Codexa (why this story was released 3 issues later is anyone's guess though, since this story doesn't seem to indicate any of the plot from issues 4 and 5 though)
• This is the first issue of the new continuity to use only one artist throughout all the different story locations/threads. ALSO, it is a new artist to the series!
• This issue gives us a big dose of Cybertronian measurements of time, so I decided to ask the writer if he could confirm what the dates would translate as by our standards. A cycle is a day, but is shorter than an Earth day, a Kilocycle would be a Cybertronian year, but as the name suggests is actually around 1000 Cycles long, and a Megacycle is a millennium, or 1000(ish) Megacycles. Answer here
• The issue begins with an abbreviated version of the Nominus Edict, which, as could be surmised from the previous issues mainly covers the restriction of Energon, the founding of new colonies and birth of new Cybertronians. It also states that non integral weapons are banned on Cybertron....so...how did Quake use his massive cannon last issue?
• Nominus Prime is also confirmed to be an Autobot, and the former head of the Autobot party, before Sentinel, who is the current one.
• Due to the rebuilding process and general destruction, we can assume that the war with the Threefold Spark ended about 2000 Cybertronian years ago (from the context of the "present" being the main setting of the series, and not the real world present day), which would be approximately 6000 Earth years in the past.
• We learn here that Megatron was a miner, and gladiator before his senatorial position, and Orion was an archivist. Both being the roles held by the characters in the Aligned continuity (Megatron was also a miner in IDWv1, and Orion was an archivist in Dreamwave, but as Optronix)
• The statue of Primus briefly seen being rescued by Orion and Megatron is based on his mythical appearance in IDWv1, well at least from the head, which is all we've seen so far!
• The winged moon of Termagax was pretty much complete about 300 Kilocycles ago, which would be about 900 Earth years before the "present"
• So it turns out that Codexa wasn't a Senator, like I assumed she was, but she was Orion's mentor and the head archivist before going "Immersant" (aka melding into Cybertron)
• From his request to get permission to do something that could endanger someone else, it seems likely that Orion asked Bumblebee to go undercover with the Ascenticons, as we saw him trying to join them last issue.
• We learn a bit more about the Threefold Spark, it was led, or was influenced by someone called "Exarchon"...wonder if we'll see him in some way soon? :D