I, Lowtech

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I'm starting with the Man in the Mirror/ I'm asking him to change his ways...
"I, Lowtech"
Publisher	Fun Publications
First published	September 17, 2008
Written by	Trent Troop and Greg Sepelak
Illustration by	Nick Roche
Colors by	Winston Bolen
Continuity	TransTech
Page count	47

A high-ranking TransTech businessman finds himself inexplicably trapped inside a lowtech body, and will stop at nothing to regain what is rightfully his.

Synopsis

Events from the prologue are in italics

Inside a dampened room, Cheetor and Stungun interrogate a damaged and uncooperative suspect. The mech demands to see his solicitor, but Stungun tells him that mouthpiece doesn't have the clearance. Cheetor tells the unbelieving suspect that according to the Barax Act, his legal counsel can get his information...so long as he testifies to the police investigation. The outraged suspect refuses, and Cheetor, content to wait, sets up a datacon, playing back the damaged and fragmented memories of one Bulletbike...

The TransTech businessman Bulletbike is trapped in darkness, feeling as though something is smothering him. Feeling a sensation of falling, Bulletbike cuts offline for sometime, until groggily waking up. With all his senses but the most basic ones missing, Bulletbike watches as a big, dark shape appears on his low-rez vision. The shape, prodding him with a cudgel, demands he gets up, and as Bulletbike struggles to get to his feet, he notices that he's not in the Auron District, and that the mech prodding him is a lowtech (quickly mentally correcting himself to "offworlder"). Bulletbike asks the robot who he is, and when the large robot tells him that he's Officer Blastcharge, the confused Bulletbike notices the Axiom Nexus Security Administration badge, realizing he's in the Offworlder Zone. Angered by the cop's insults, the TransTech buisnessman gets up to his full height, proclaiming himself to be the 37th richest mech on Cybertron and CEO of RoboCo, and threatens to call Blastcharge's commander. As the cop laughs, Bulletbike equillibrium fails him, and he staggers onto his hands and knees above a puddle...in which he finally notices his appearance. Someone has put him into a lowtech body, horrifying the former TransTech.

The sensory input briefly overloads Bulletbike, and Blastcharge helps him out, pointing him to Widow's Cafe Cybertronian. Blastcharge transforms and drives off with one final insult, leaving Bulletbike to stew. Looking over his new primitive form, Bulletbike tries to figure out how he ended up like this. His last memory was of the party celebrating the defense contract between RoboCo and the Senate. Unusually, he surged out after 8 or 9 cycles, despite his advanced systems; Bulletbike figures someone put something in his drink. All that comes after that are hazy dreams, crushed in a immense hand, and he reflects that the urban legends of offworlder spark swaps are true after all. Noticing the similarity between his treatment and those of murderers and transit bandits, he wonders if a vigilante has done this to him for "actions" his lawyers have ensured aren't technically illegal. Suddenly, Bulletbike is interrupted by the Predacon, Sling, who asks for the time and some fuel. Bulletbike notices the shiv in the Predacon's hand, and tries to get away. Sling edges forth to steal his fuel, but the struggling Bulletbike punches him in the face, and begins to run off. Sling, having transformed into his beast mode, prepares to kill his victim. Bulletbike holds the Predacon's mouth back with his arm as his free hand grabs a pipe, knocking him in the head over and over until he thinks he's knocked him into stasis lock. Unfortunately, as Bulletbike gets up, he realizes that he's killed the Predacon. Horrified, Bulletbike drags his corpse to a nearby refuse chute, and throws him in there, knowing that the Axiom Nexus Security Administration is unlikely to look into the Heap. Picking up the shiv, Bulletbike begins to feel light, the fight having burned most of his energy, and falls into stasis lock.

Bulletbike is soon jolted awake by a concerned derelict, who gets him up. Bulletbike doesn't even have enough energy to speak, and the Autobot derelict gives him a foul smelling and even worse tasting brew, which nevertheless re-energizes him. Asked by the derelict for his name, Bulletbike tells him who he is, and is surprised when the robot believes him, telling the former TransTech that no one believes who he is either. Taking a swig, the derelict tells him that people call him Scrounge, but that he's really Emirate Xaaron of Primax 093.0 Epsilon. Scrounge claims that he was able to get in past the security, but someone took his Matrix, causing him to downgrade into this form, and asks Bulletbike if he's seen it. Bulletbike plays along, telling him he hasn't, and asks Scrounge to help him find his way to an EconTerm. Scrounge agrees, although not before he asks for some fuel, and the pair transform. Pained by his transformation, Bulletbike is annoyed by the simplicity of his form, and is amazed by Scrounge's "vehicular" mode-a disk. Bulletbike's parts barely fit together, and his fuel is leaking, with his energon reserves burning at an increased rate. Along the way, Bulletbike gets the chance to truly observe the Offworlder Zone for the first time; Bulletbike notices as the conditions improve upon each level, and feels unnerved at how unnoticed he is. Still, he complains to himself as exhaust blows into him, and a bot nearly walks into him while he spritzes his scraplet infested arm, leaving Bulletbike eager to get out of here.

Arriving at the EconTerm, Bulletbike tries to have his onboard computer (called a custodian) retrieve his access codes, only to quickly realize he doesn't have his computer anymore. Trying to remember his account number, Bulletibke is quickly embarrassed at the fact that he can't remember that, either. Scrounge soon begins to tug at his shoulder, pointing out to Bulletbike his true face appearing on the holoprojected newsfeed. Bulletbike tells his companion that it's probably just a recording. The recording, however, begins giving a speech Bulletbike only wrote and never gave, even changing some of the wording, calling the Offworlders a threat to no one but themselves. Bulletbike is horrified, having realized the truth, and begins to hallucinate, feeling the eyes of everyone around him on him. As the world turns red, Bulletbike sees his true body gripping him in his hands, crushing him. Scrounge, having nearly been hurt by Bulletbike, brings him back to reality, and Bulletbike apologizes to his companion. Bulletbike tells Scrounge that someone (whom the latter identifies as Bulletbike's nemesis) has stolen his body. Telling his companion to meet him back in three megacycles, Bulletbike watches as Scrounge rolls off, going to the Heap to look around for reports of body snatching and fuel. Bulletbike heads the opposite way, spying a bot he recognizes as one of the Omnicons, Skyblast, having employed some Omnicons in his factory. The Omnicon's armor, shining white, indicates his wealth, and Bulletbike sneaks up behind him with his stolen shiv, telling the Autobot jet to cooperate and hand over his money. As Skyblast attempts to form some energon blades, Bulletbike thrusts his shiv into the bot, and before he can scream, snaps the robot's neck, killing him. Bulletbike feels odd; all throughout his life, he felt sick for even the tiniest amount of violence, but all he feels now is power. Taking the bot to a nearby dumpster, he grabs the dead bot's loaded cred-key, and heads off.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Decepticons	Predacons	Others
Skids (4) Cheetor (5) Stungun (6) Scrounge (9) Flareup (10) Bumblebee (11) Skyblast (13) Alpha Trion (23)	Bulletbike (3) Blastcharge (7) Frenzy (12) Swindle the Second (14) Swindle the Third (15) Swindle the First (16) Starscream (24)	Sling (8) Backslash (18)	Bulletbike (1) Andromeda (2) Ego (17) A Vehidrone (19) Aurik (20) Plush lizard (21) Cyclis (22)

Quotes

"Who are you?"
"Officer Blastcharge, but if you don't get up in the next cycle, it's going to be 'Sir Please Stop Thumping Me Across The Alleyway.'"

—Bulletbike & Blastcharge trade pleasantries

"Good day, friend, welcome to Swindle, Swindle and Swindle. I'm Swindle the Second, but you can call me Swindle. This here is Swindle the Third, but you can call him Swindle too. What can we do ya for?"

—A Swindle greets his new customer

"And exactly where were you during Bulletbike's rampage and the solar cycles leading up to it, Commander Cheetor? Do you routinely allow murderers to wander your precinct unmolested?"
"Just off the top of my processor... the Gutcruncher rebellion and the ongoing black market raids, two riots, the incident with General Demolishor, sixteen murders unrelated to this case, twelve armed robberies, three major traffic snarls, fifty-six minor accidents, and four inter-faction rumbles. Plus, all the times the Senate has 'requested' my personal appearance. We're stretched thin even with the assistance of the Freelance Police Legion. If we're pointing servos, however, border security, which is under your jurisdiction, was egregiously lax in investigating Ego's transport. Personally, I'd be worried about what else is slipping through."
"That matter is being investigated, I assure you."

—Starscream and Cheetor discuss a typical week in the Offworlder Zones

"If Bulletbike is what can happen when the system fails... why take the risk in voluntarily removing [the clarity codecs]?"
"Did you know that some organics willingly ingest non-lethal doses of deadly poisons?"
"Uh, no, sir?"
"It's to build up an immunity. Small, careful doses. Their body learns to fight it. Eventually, they can handle amounts that would, under normal conditions, kill them. So, think of this as building up an immunity to the urge to kill."
"I... guess that makes sense, sir. But I lost my temper with those two grease-stain chiselers, what if..."
"Don't worry, I wanted to knock their smug little heads together too. Millions of supposedly 'lower' mechanoids in this city have gone gigavorns without crossing the line. We're supposed to be 'transcendent'... if we need some piece of code implanted in us to foster basic morality, then what's the point? The trick isn't not having those feelings, Stungun. It's learning how to handle them. We augment the body, but not the spark. That takes hard work. ...besides, if you crossed that line, you'd be wearing a restraining bolt before you hit the ground."

—Stungun and Cheetor

Notes

• Mentioned characters include Strika, Emirate Xaaron, Unicron, Sideways, Sidestep, Swindle the First's Bulletbike, Twitcher F451, Cryotek, Corvo, Primus, Megatron, Megatron, Bricolo, Scorponok, Scorponok, the Vok, Gutcruncher, General Demolishor, Hoist, and two grease-stained chiselers.

Continuity notes

• Blastcharge previously appeared in "Withered Hope". The Widow's Cafe Cybertronian also appeared in that story, having first appeared in "Gone Too Far".
• At one point in the story Bulletbike rolls pass Animated Bumblebee and BotCon exclusive Flareup; Bumblebee and Flareup appeared together in BotCon 2008 script reading "Bee in the City".

Transformer references

• TransTech Bulletbike's original body (and Generation 2 Bulletbike's current one) is based off the Beast Machines Thrust toy.
• As is standard for the TransTech stories, plenty of offworlders from various franchises show up. Aside from Generation 2 Power Master Bulletbike's body, these include:
  • Generation 1 Skids, who shows up in the preview.
  • The Universe version of Beast Machines Blastcharge.
  • Beast Wars Neo Sling.
  • Scrounge is a Marvel original Transformers character, introduced in issue #17.
  • Animated Bumblebee and BotCon 2005 exclusive Flareup.
  • Live-action movie Frenzy.
  • Energon Skyblast.
• The "rough simulation image" of Bulletbike in the preview is an extremely toy accurate drawing of him, down to the connected feet and flat face.
• The line, "Unit Designate PM4-Bulletbike," refers to the offworlder Bulletbike's Power Master ID number. His home universe, Primax 095.0 Beta, is the universe of his tech specs, taken from his release year.
• Bulletbike notes he only had his echolocation senses for a quartex, a unit of time introduced in the first Transformers episode.
• Blastcharge sarcastically responds to Bulletbike's claims by telling him he's "Grand Admiral Strika the Sixth," a TransTech version of the Beast Machines character.
• Blastcharge tells Bulletbike to hurry before the Junkion Sanitation Service comes to pick up the garbage; Junkions first appeared in The Transformers: The Movie.
• The insult "empty" is used throughout the story; empties are derelict, often unaffiliated Transformers introduced in the Marvel Comics, who are forced to scavenge for what little energy they have.
• Bulletbike is confused by the lettering on his feet, not realizing it's upside down; the letters are from the sticker on his toy, reading "BULLETBIKE PM4".
• Foods and drinks served at Bulletbike's party include: Schaeffer Energy (from Victory episode Battle Up of Wrath!!), Isidrite (from Transformers cartoon episode Webworld), and polonium spritzers (from the previous two TransTech stories).
• Bulletbike swears by Nexus Zero, home of the Vok from Beast Wars.
• Xaaron was an Autobot commander introduced in the Marvel UK Transformers comic.
• Scrounge isn't very good at being Xaaron. He claims he has a Matrix and that he's from universe Primax 093.0 Epsilon. Decoding that technobabble allegedly pegs him as an Emirate Xaaron from Transformers Fan Club fiction published in 1993. Yyyyyeah.
• Scraplets are metal eating parasites from the Marvel Transformers comics; the only thing that could cure an infestation was water.
• Scrounge notes that Bulletbike's custodian system is like the onboard computer the "animal-type bolts" talk to; in Beast Wars, Maximals and Predacons would speak aloud to their computers when performing various actions.
• Scrounge tells Bulletbike to let him tell of his supposed "encounter" with Unicron and Sideways.
• Bulletbike notes that Omnicons hail from the Aurex Cluster (aka the various Unicron Trilogy fictions) and notes of their ability to shape raw energon.
• Bulletbike remembers that he once got angry at one of his workers, Sidestep, for misaligning his energon drip, and threw a chronometer at him.
• The image for the Swindle, Swindle and Swindle shop is filled with various easter eggs, including:
  • A sheet displaying various faction symbols, including: the original Generation 1 Autobot and Decepticon symbols; the Generation 2 Autobot and Decepticon symbols; the Beast Wars Maximal and Predacon symbols; the Beast Machines Maximal, Vehicon, and Dinobot symbols; the TransTech Autobot and Decepticon symbols; the Beast Wars Neo Blendron/Minion of Unicron symbol; both versions of the Playskool Go-Bots symbol; the Wrecker symbol, introduced in 3H Productions' comics; the Beast Machines-era Predacon symbol, seen in BotCon 2006 comic "Dawn of Future's Past"; the Japanese Generation 2 Cybertron Alliance symbol; the South American Generation 1 Optimus and Malignus symbols; and the Cyber Planet Key symbols for Velocitron, Jungle Planet, Earth, and Gigantion.
  • Generation 1 Pretender Beast Catilla's shell helmet.
  • Generation 1 Pretender Bludgeon's shell helmet.
  • Live-action movie Bumblebee's air freshener from his 70's Camaro alt-mode.
  • IDW Generation 1 Outback's arm, used by IDW Kup as a bludgeon in "Spotlight: Kup".
  • Generation 1 Jetfire's toy arm guard.
  • Generation 1 Omega Supreme's alternate mode tracks.
  • Generation 1 Optimus Prime's Powermaster partner Hi-Q in engine mode.
  • Jars labeled with images of a Tyrannosaurus, a tarantula, and a gorilla, presumably referring to Beast Wars Megatron, Tarantulas, and Optimus Primal.
  • A box of empty Matrix of Leadership containers.
  • The IDW Generation 1 Magnificence.
  • The bird statue from issue #62 of the Marvel Transformers comic.
  • Megatron's "lightsaber" from The Transformers: The Movie, along with Starscream's crown.
  • One of the Golden Disks from Beast Wars.
• Ego's showroom, as well, contains a variety of easter eggs, including:
  • Ego's showroom, meanwhile, displays Leozack's gun, Stalker's missile, an Autobot jet pack, Scorponok's claw, a time-jump mechanism, Skyblast's Energon Spear, Blacker's sword, Tantrum's sword, Battle Ravage's tail-mace, Star Saber's Saberblade sword, Skywarp's arm guns, Megatron's fusion cannon, Soundwave's weaponry, Fistfight, Optimus Prime's ion blaster, Ultra Magnus's gun, an Exosuit, a Velocitronian Cyber Key, the AllSpark and the Matrix. While not pictured, Ego's desk is said to be built out of the shield of a Scorponok hailing from Primax 787.3 Alpha (in English, it's the Scorponok from the Japanese The Headmasters cartoon, so it's likely the Zarak Shield), and a sword labeled "Sword Of Megatron" hovers over it. Also not pictured but mentioned are a Requiem Blaster, a Jungle Planet Cyber Planet Key, a Reconfiguration Matrix and a spherical Vok instrument.
• Swindle tries to recommend Twitcher F451 to Bulletbike as a mental health technician.
• "Ego" is Generation 1 Starscream's French-Canadian name. He runs "C-Kar Technologies." Argh.
  • Fittingly, the last bit of dialogue between Ego and Bulletbike mirrors Starscream's brief dialogue with Galvatron in The Transformers: The Movie.
• Likewise, "Bricolo" is Scrapper's French-Canadian name. And he's an artist making furniture out of Transformer parts.
• "Corvo" is Skywarp's Italian name.
• The two "grease-stain chiselers" Stungun mentions are Jackpot and Hubcap, who ran afoul of the local police (and just about everyone else) in "Gone Too Far".
• Cheetor and Stungun muse that the whole Bulletbike fiasco could easily be set straight if only they could explain how TransTech Bulletbike's spark ended up in the lowtech Bulletbike's body. (As it stood, there was no evidence of spark transfer, so that wasn't a viable theory.) Additionally, the impostor Bulletbike recalls much of his forces to his building to protect him from the rampaging lowtech Bulletbike. This has the added effect of leaving the Transwarp Complex open to attack. Taking into consideration the events of the Transcendent story, an answer (confirmed in a flashback in "The Coming Storm: Part 1") appears. Topspin's spark-manipulation abilities would easily explain the spark transfer, setting up the removal of the guards from the Transwarp Complex, allowing Alpha Trion to escape to his home world.

Real-world references

• The title is probably a reference to Isaac Asimov's famous story collection, I, Robot. While I, Robot is not the first appearance of the "I, Noun" formulation (I, Claudius, for example), it's certainly the most famous involving robots. (I, Robot-Master! is a much clearer case.)
• Bulletbike's home is in the Auron District, possibly named for the character from Final Fantasy X and Kingdom Hearts II, two franchise which author Greg Sepelak has a..."love-hate" relationship with.
• Blastcharge tells Bulletbike that "you don't have to go home, but you can't defrag here," paraphrasing lyrics from Closing Time by Semisonic.
• Blastcharge sarcastically tells Bulletbike that he's part of the "gaussing Smart Patrol," named for the video game and accompanying Devo album.
• Autopol, the TransTech Zone's police, is named for international organization Interpol.
• Part of the diagnostic that reads out when Bulletbike drinks reads "TAS2R38-42"; TAS2R38 is one of the bitter taste receptors in humans.
• The plush lizard in Ego's office is the Winslow, a central MacGuffin of Phil Foglio's "Buck Godot: Zap Gun For Hire" comics.
• At one point Bulletbike thinks that the force of a Vehidrone's voice is "one degree shy of sadistic", a line from the song "SenSurround" by They Might Be Giants.
• Bulletbike also notes that the Vehidrone has a "WVNG-class voice modulator", which might be a reference to Hugo Weaving.
• "Isen Power Station" and a "D-wy warehouse district" are mentioned as places Vehidrones can be found, a possible reference to a certain pair of Animated creators.
• While talking to Ego. Bulletbike apparently says he works in 'murders and executions', which Ego responds with he also worked in 'mergers and acquisitions', mirroring a scene from the horror film American Psycho.

Errors

• The data-con is referred to as a datacon, missing the hyphen.
• Isidrite is misspelled as "isodrite".

External links

• "I, Lowtech" at The Official Transformers Collectors' Club