TFNation - Signal of Doom

Written by: Ralph Burns & Andrew Turnbull

Illustrated by: Nate Webb

Cover Art by: Ed Pirrie & Matt Marshall

Plot

This story is a "Choose Your Own Adventure" book, so where the story would deviate to a bad ending, I'll mark it in parentheses, bold and italics (as such) Anything outside of these are the ideal storyline. Occasionally a bad route can be taken, but can be reversed to a good route, but I am just taking the most direct routes here.

Battle Unicorn (You) returns to Cybertron, but finds the planet under radio silence and with no life signs anywhere, until he receives an SOS from the planet.

(Battle Unicorn opens the SOS, and is directed to the Central Spaceport and decides to head there to investigate, however he finds a strange group of Cybertronians there, that he doesn't recognise, and before he can do anything he is ambushed and his spark is extracted)

Battle Unicorn hovers above the planet in his ship, and decide to land in Cybertropolis instead of the Central Spaceport, you see a group of Cybertronians you don't recognise, but smartly decide to leave them be

(You are foolish and approach the Cybertronians and get your spark extracted)

You walk towards the Central Spaceport to investigate the area from afar, but are surprised when a blinding light hits you and you plummet into a tunnel system, you see some lights down the tunnel, you ignore them, and head further into the darkness, where you encounter the Oracle itself, who tells you about Megatron conquering Cybertron and is calling wayward Cybertronians back to the planet with a fake distress signal to capture them too. The super computer gives you the option to help it...

(You decide to run away from the Oracle and proceed with you own mission to stop Megatron, but soon realise that you may have led the Drones to the Oracle's chamber, you return to save it, but you are instead captured, and you witness the Oracle being dismantled...)

You decide to accept help from the Oracle and are reformatted. You learn how to control your new form and are sent on a mission to destroy the Transmission Facility and proceed with you own mission to stop Megatron, and make it to the surface, you make your way to the Central Computer, where you link up to the computer to figure out where the Transmitter Facility is...

(You decide to stay hooked up for a while longer to determine what Megatron's plan really is, and you learn that he, after the Beast Wars on Earth returned to Cybertron and created his virus to conquer the world. Infuriated, you decide to go after Megatron at his fortress in Cybertropolis. He is, however, soon ambushed and is attacked by Jetstorm...ending his story there...)

You disconnect from the network and start to leave, you are attacked by a group of Tank Drones however...

(You go on the offensive and charge at them, but you are eventually caught by them, and are taken out)

You use your beast mode's seismic hooves to send the Vehicons flying and you run for your life, you see a load of Drones assembled

(You try sneaking past them, but they notice you and are captured and taken out by Jetstorm)

You go for higher ground to avoid the Vehicons, and are near the Tramsitter, but find a Transit Tube, that would get you to the Transmitter controls in record time

(You take the tube, but are ambushed by Jetstorm, who fires missiles at the prone vehicle, destroying it, and you along side it...)

You realise it would be foolish to take the Tube, so you enter the building and take the walkways instead, you follow the paths laid out for you, when you come across a small gap you can leap over

(You ignore the leap and continue down the pathway, but you made a mistake, and are taken out by a missile from Jetstorm)

You leap across the small gap, and continue doing that between buildings, until you start finding the gaps too far apart

(You return to the pathways, but are quickly dispatched by Jetstorm with a missile)

You make your way to the ground, and have eye-contact with the transmitter, you notice no Vehicons between you and the facility

(You rush out to the facility, but are quickly flanked upon, and taken out of commission)

You pause, and a Drone passes by you, not noticing you in the shadows, you dash towards the facility, where you see it is guarded by an army of drones.

(You try to sneak into the facility, but you trip the alarms and you are overcome with the Vehicons, who take you down, and extract your spark)

You transform and bellow out a threat to the drones, causing them to chase you

(You head to the transmitter controls, you enter the deactivation code, and it works and the transmission is stopped...however you realize that this was too simple, and the transmission can simply be reactivated, you should have gone to the power planet instead! With that, Jetstorm appears and take you out)

You diverge from the original plan and head to the power plant, you arrive and realize you don't have energy weapons any more..

(You try to overload the consoles, but cannot do so in time...Jetstorm arrives and takes you down)

You use you battle axe to smash the console apart and cause a chain reaction that causes the entire plant to go up. You resign yourself to you fate, when you are teleported to safety by the Oracle.

You have succeeded in this battle, but the war is not over and Megatron must still be defeated, and you will be hiding in the shadows until the day you can make your move....

Characters

Maximal

Battle Unicorn - Technorganic Unicorn (Killed/Spark Extracted by Vehicons - Bad Endings Only)

Vehicon

Jetstorm - Jet

Aero Drones - Jets

Tank Drones - Tanks

Cycle Drones - Motorcycles

Mole Drones

Megatron - Dragon (Mentioned)

Autobot

Sparkless Shells

Xaaron (Mentioned)

Admiral Rodney (Mentioned)

Other

The Oracle/Vector Sigma (Dismantled by Vehicons - Bad Endings Only)

Cybertronian Population (Mentioned) Sparks Captured by Megatron

Notes

• This is the TFNation 2019 exclusive fiction.
• This year we have a choose your own adventure style book, as such the plot synopsis will feature the "bad endings" as well as the "true ending"
• The timing of this story is unclear, but the presence of Jetstorm implies that this happens during the events of Season One of Beast Machines....but where are Optimus and his crew then? As soon as Botanica arrived on the planet they went out to try and save her!
• The branching options on page 9 make no sense. if you choose the "bad road" on page 19, you speak about how the Oracle is being dismantled and how you'll never learn of Megatron's secret plans....you haven't been informed of EITHER of those things in the story yet!
• On Page 11 to can decide to run away from the Oracle BEFORE you get reformatted on the next page, yet you are later referred to as Technorganic, and can complete the story from then on
• The comments about Battle Unicorn waiting in the shadows may be to explain why he never encounters Primal and his team...
• So...the Oracle can teleport at great distances? WHY DID IT NEVER DO THAT TO HELP THE MAIN CHARACTERS?!?!?
• Quite a few references are made in this story to things like "Pretenders", the "Multiforce" etc, but since context isn't ever given I'll only mention them in the character list if they are definitive names of characters etc