Darkness, Once Gazed Upon: Part Two

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"Darkness, Once Gazed Upon: Part Two"
Publisher	IDW Publishing
First published	December 15, 2021
Cover date	December 2021
Written by	Brian Ruckley
Art by	Anna Malkova
Colors	David García Cruz
Letters by	Jake M. Wood
Editor	David Mariotte, Tom Waltz and Riley Farmer
Continuity	2019 IDW continuity

Smokescreen leads a team of Autobots into enemy territory to rescue Ultra Magnus.

Synopsis

When molten plasma flooded the Forge Pyramid and destroyed it, all of the Titansparks hidden under the building were annihilated... all of them, that is, except one. Salvaged by Decepticons and delivered straight into Megatron's waiting hands, this nascent life will become Megatron's greatest weapon: a Titan capable of toppling Optimus Prime's Crystal City stronghold. Buoyed by his latest prize, Megatron orders Mindwipe to bring the forges back online and call up as many sparks as possible, before Soundwave arrives to bring news to his leader: Ultra Magnus has arrived at Decepticon Headquarters. Manacled and hauled before the Decepticon leadership, Magnus refuses to break—and remains defiant even when brought before the leader of the Decepticons.

In Crystal City, Arcee says her goodbyes to Greenlight and Gauge as she prepares for her latest mission. Despite Greenlight's concerns that she might not return home from a dangerous sortie into enemy territory, Arcee remains adamant: when they joined Optimus Prime's exodus out of Iacon, they chose a side—now, she has to honor that choice by giving this mission her all. With the Decepticons massing for an attack, Greenlight warns her that she has to come back alive, before the little family embrace one last time.

In Decepticon Headquarters, Ultra Magnus does his best to make Megatron understand the peril they all face; Megatron's narrow focus on conquest and war have blinded him to the real threat: Exarchon has returned, and has already claimed Ruckus as his first victim. Despite the gravity of these warnings, Megatron doesn't believe the general for an instant; despite Magnus's insistences, he's more interested in finding out about Crystal City's current defenses. Desperate to be heard, Magnus turns his attention to his former compatriot Strika; he finds that while Strika respects him, her loyalty to Megatron's ideology blinds her to the truth. Tired of the theatrics, Megatron announces he's done with this pointless interrogation: Magnus can join their other prisoners in the old Senate building. As Slipstream, Blackjack, and Flamewar haul him off, Strika offhandedly considers checking up on Ruckus as a precaution; Starscream agrees, but Megatron has more important things to focus on—Starscream can chase rumors all he wants, but the impending siege of Crystal City is where the future will be written. In Iacon's medical center, Cyclonus has grown increasingly concerned regarding "Provoke"'s refusal to tear herself away from Cybertron's archives and interact with her old comrade. "Provoke" insists that she still has not fully recovered from her traumatic experience; when the conversation turns to the plasma pyres that incinerated their fallen friends, however, Cyclonus quickly realizes that something's amiss when she remembers Gridlock's funeral: his body was never cremated.

In a disused tunnel underneath Iacon, Arcee has met up with the other Autobots assigned to the rescue mission: Windblade, Chromia, and their leader Smokescreen, whose espionage skills have made him an invaluable asset. Smokescreen last used this passageway when he and Swindle worked together, which runs right into a secret room in Swindle's casino. Although long abandoned, it hasn't yet been sealed off; when Smokescreen abruptly pokes his head into Swindle's private quarters, he gives its proprietor a nasty surprise. Annoyed by this unwelcome surprise, Smokescreen has to persuade him not to sic his bodyguards on the Autobots; indeed, Smokescreen tells him that he's in the market for a discreet exit out of Iacon; if he shuts down the casino to expedite their speedy escape, he can make the effort worth the while...

Inside the ruins of the Senate building, defaced with Decepticon graffiti and repurposed into a crude prison, Ultra Magnus is horrified to see dozens of immobile, manacled Senators, all slowly rusting away. Among the prisoners is Senator Crisscross, who explains that this is the sentence Megatron has reserved for all of the prisoners under his rule: a slow, agonizing execution via energon starvation. Thanks to a tipoff from Swindle, Smokescreen and his team have learned that this is where Ultra Magnus has been sent; from a nearby building, the team launch a grappling hook onto the Senate roof, easily dispatch the guards, and deactivate the laser grid that prevents them from accessing the interior of the building. Windblade's horrified at the sight of dozens of Senators slowly dying, while Smokescreen breaks Magnus free. Unfortunately, without the necessary manpower required to mount a full-scale rescue mission, this means that Magnus will have to leave Crisscross and the others to their fate. At his casino, Swindle honors his end of the deal by closing up shop early, as Roughstuff shows some stragglers the door... but with profits continually trending downwards since the Decepticon takeover, Trickdiamond is furious at the idea of taking the rest of the cycle off and says as much. Not even Swindle's assurances that Smokescreen will reward them for their cooperation has any effect; snarling that his decision to negotiate with the Autobots will get them all killed, Trickdiamond stalks from the room and puts through a call on her personal communicator to Starscream—as Head of Intelligence, he once promised her everything if Swindle ever went down. Now it's time to collect on that offer...

With no other way out, Magnus and his rescuers must make a conspicuous exit by first bashing down the prison door from the inside, then overwhelming the lightly-armed guards. Once they're free, the quintet race through the empty streets of Iacon, bulldoze through a Decepticon checkpoint, and make it back to the now-empty casino, where they're greeted by a furious Swindle and Roughstuff. Swindle insists that bringing Magnus here has only put a target on his head, but before he can order Roughstuff to throw out the trespassers, Arcee points her blaster at his head and orders him to summon and arm Elita-1 and Bumblebee, who'll be coming with them back to Crystal City. Outside, meanwhile, the Decepticons have already caught on to the enemy in their midst: Sixshot and a battalion of Decepticons have already assembled outside the building, with orders to arrest—or kill—everyone inside...

Featured characters

(Characters in italic text appear only in hallucinatory form.)
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Decepticons	Threefold Spark	Others
Ultra Magnus (7) Arcee (11) Greenlight (12) Gauge (13) Smokescreen (20) Chromia (21) Windblade (22)	Megatron (1) Mindwipe (2) Soundwave (3) Blackjack (4) Starscream (5) Strika (6) Sixshot (8) Flamewar (9) Slipstream (10) Twirl (27) Tentakil (28) Cy-Kill (29) Offroad (30) Triton (31) Gutcruncher (31) Catgut (32) Ravage (33) Treadshot (34) Jolt (35) Nautilator (36) Cindersaur (37) Flamefeather (38) Scatterspike (39)	Exarchon (14)	Cyclonus (15) Highfire (16) Grudge (17) Gridlock (18) Paragon (19) Swindle (23) Crisscross (24) Trickdiamond (25) Roughstuff (26)

Quotes

"So you come back, Arcee. You come back safe and soon. Agreed?"
"With every glimmer of my spark."
"The only point in fighting is for us to be together, safe and soon, in a better future."

—Greenlight and Arcee

"You have to listen. All of you. This isn't just about your ambitions now. It's not about this war you seem to want."
"Want? Or need? When an end is necessary—inevitable—the means become so, too."

—Ultra Magnus and Megatron

"Am I not allowed a single cycle without a nasty surprise? Is that some new rule that no one told me about?"
"Just stay calm, Swindle."
"I'd rather call Roughstuff up here and have him try to break your head. He'd probably fail, but at least I'd feel like he was serving some sort of notional purpose."

—Swindle and Smokescreen

"Yeah, I feel kind of bad. He'll never trust another word I say again. If he survives the consequences."
"That's where we all live now. Hoping to survive the consequences."

—Smokescreen and Arcee

"Damn Megatron. Senator Crisscross? Can you hear me? We'll be back for you and the rest. Somehow."
"D-don't, General. We choose this resistance. You go, and fight your own way. But don't promise a dawn to those in darkness... unless you're in the sun."

—Ultra Magnus and Crisscross

"Primus. This place is..."
"The void Megatron has sculpted for his enemies. And a wound we cannot heal right now. So yes. If we are going, we go. And learn to live with the guilt of it."

—Chromia and Ultra Magnus

Notes

Continuity notes

• The Forge Pyramid on Cybertron was destroyed back in issue #29; the flood of molten plasma was said to have annihilated the sixteen Titansparks that Perceptor had hidden beneath the building on the orders of Nominus Prime. The issue ended with the Decepticons forcibly de-orbiting all of the remaining Titans over Cybertron, and the 2021 annual revealed that Lodestar was now the last Titan in existence... although, as we pointed out in the notes to that issue, it seemed likely that Megatron was fibbing when he told Optimus that all of the Titansparks were destroyed in #30.
• Arcee, Greenlight, and Gauge last appeared together in the "Gauging the Truth" arc of Transformers: Galaxies, in which they clashed with Heretech's rogue Reversionist faction. Arcee had previously reappeared during a flashback in issue #31, which revealed that she'd reenlisted with Pyra Magna's Companions; this issue reveals that Gauge and Greenlight have relocated to Crystal City along with Arcee and joined the Autobots.
• While under interrogation, Ultra Magnus recounts multiple events from recent issues: the swarm of Insecticon clones from Escape #5, the collapse of the Rust Sea in issue #36, and the return of Exarchon from the same issue, although Magnus and Optimus only learned that he'd killed Ruckus and stolen his body after speaking with Codexa in the last issue. He also notes that Megatron followed him during the War of the Threefold Spark; Galaxies #10 opened with a flashback showing the two fighting back-to-back during the conflict.
• While standing next to Sixshot—whom she's taken a dislike to ever since the events of issue #9—Flamewar makes faces at him before trying to act tough by attempting (and failing) to copy Shadow Striker's threat from #9: "touch me and I'll rip your arm off and find out how much of it I can fit through one of your eye sockets."
• After his conversation with "Provoke", Cyclonus's hallucinatory ghosts all reminisce about what happened to their bodies after they'd died. While Highfire and Grudge note that their bodies were disposed of via plasma pyre, the same machine used for Brainstorm's funeral in issue #4, Gridlock notes that Termagax took possession of his body in the hopes of finding out the weapon that'd killed him—and, in doing so, plugs a tiny loose end that goes all the way back to issue #8, in which his severed head could be glimpsed in Termagax's private citadel.
• As noted in his first appearance in issue #19, Smokescreen's top-secret missions have taken him far and wide across Cybertronian space in the service of multiple different branches of the Cybertronian government. Here, he reminisces about a time when he and Swindle helped bring Motormaster down, back when Streetwise ran Security Operations. Since then, however, he's stepped down to run one of Cybertron's police academies as per dialogue in #19, allowing Chromia to fill his position.
• When Swindle temporarily closes the casino, his bodyguard Roughstuff shoos Twirl and Tentakil away—they're clearly regulars, having appeared in basically every scene set at Swindle's since its introduction in issue #20.
• After overthrowing the Senate and deposing Sentinel Prime in issue #23, Megatron ordered Strika to turn the main Senate building into a prison for the remaining Senators in #26. The building still shows scars from the attack—most notably, a jury-rigged laser grid over the ceiling covers the hole the three Rainmakers created when they melted their way through the roof.
• Senator Crisscross first (and last) appeared as a hologram way back when in issue #10, although it remains unclear as to whether he represents the Autobot party, some other faction, or if he's an independent like Straxxus.

Transformers references

• Knickknacks in Swindle's apartment include a mounted version of Animated Swindle's scatter blaster, plus the magnetic weapon he used in the Animated cartoon. Also present is what appears to be the Triptych Mask as it appeared in issue #34.
• A "Generation 1" version of the GoBots character Crasher has been a supporting character for some time now, so perhaps it shouldn't be much of a surprise that the long-suffering Cy-Kill would eventually join the party. His one-panel cameo shows him moments before Ultra Magnus bashes down the door on his head—and while he's not explicitly killed on-panel like his other appearances, it's definitely the latest in a long string of unflattering defeats.
• Marvel UK-original character Triton makes an appearance on the same page, guarding a security checkpoint opposite Offroad, who'd previously filled the role in #33.

Errors

• In panel 4 of page 15, the UK spelling "realise" slips into Windblade's speech bubble.

Other trivia

• Originally solicited for a December 22nd release, this issue was later moved up one week to the 15th.

Covers (3)

• Cover A: Optimus Prime walks through the valley of the shadow of death, by Alex Milne
• Cover B: Megatron crushes Ultra Magnus, by Chris Panda
• Retailer incentive cover: Soundwave sneaks up on Optimus Prime, by Livio Ramondelli

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