The Change In Your Nature Part Four
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| "The Change In Your Nature Part Four" | |||||||||||||
| Publisher | IDW Publishing | ||||||||||||
| First published | January 29, 2020 | ||||||||||||
| Cover date | December 2019 | ||||||||||||
| Written by | Brian Ruckley | ||||||||||||
| Art by | Beth McGuire-Smith (pages 1-9) Anna Malkova (pages 10-20) | ||||||||||||
| Colors by | Josh Burcham (pages 1-9) Joana Lafuente (pages 10-20) | ||||||||||||
| Letters by | Jake M. Wood | ||||||||||||
| Editor | David Mariotte and Tom Waltz | ||||||||||||
| Continuity | 2019 IDW continuity | ||||||||||||
A drastic new Ascenticon scheme takes shape as political turmoil erupts across Cybertron.
Synopsis
Tensions run high in the Senate antechamber as Senators file out of the negotiation room after a tense emergency meeting, but Froid doesn't pick up on the mood, pushing past Ironhide's security forces to speak to Nautica about his latest psychological findings. Road Rage immediately rises to see him off, but Nautica tells her bodyguard that she doesn't need her for this one. Starscream smirks at Road Rage as she watches the two depart: Starscream opines that Froid is clearly infatuated with her, like Crosscut and Proxima before, but Nautica's never had eyes for any of them.
At the current Ascenticon base of operations, Senator Heretech fills Megatron in on the details that Sentinel Prime doesn't want the Ascenticon senator to know: the upcoming Senate debate is a sham, a sting operation that will end in Soundwave's arrest and Sentinel's ultimate denunciation of the Ascenticon movement. Horrified by the decline of Cybertronian society, Heretech and his Reversionists will soon be departing Cybertron entirely to start anew elsewhere in the cosmos... so what Megatron does with this information is entirely up to him. The moment Heretech leaves the abandoned colosseum, Starscream emerges from the shadows, revealing that he's been spying on the Ascenticon leader throughout the meeting. Having backed multiple horses throughout the ongoing political crisis, Starscream asks Megatron if he knows everything about Bumblebee... and just how much he owes to Orion Pax after his expulsion from Security Operations. Megatron refuses to entertain the idea that his former colleague could be actively working against him this way, but Starscream reminds him that he could just have easily let his old friendship blind him to Orion's true nature.
At a spaceport, Nautica and Road Rage hurry into the main terminal to intercept a recently landed Voin ship that's landed in spite of Nautica's direct instructions to delay all Voin vessels until she can ascertain the damage done to Cybertron's Voin community. But the damage has already been done—through the door comes a Voin asserter, a specialized warrior ensconced in an armored sphere, controlling a phalanx of monstrous warbeasts. Nautica theorizes that the asserter has been sent to enact the Voin's idea of justice... an act of vengeance that won't stop at just one Cybertronian!
Troubled by the news, Megatron meets with Elita-1 to discuss the issue of Bumblebee: although Elita-1's report on her teammate is nothing but positive, she has concerns of her own regarding Senator Soundwave and his increasingly brazen behaviour, including her own worries that he was the one responsible for killing Ruckus's teammates in the Cybertronian Mountains. As Elita takes her leave, a weary Megatron puts in a call to Soundwave and tears into him: thanks to his own incompetence, they have no choice but to accelerate their game even further...
On Shockwave's orders, Astrotrain speeds through the Cybertronian badlands towards an outlying relay facility. Inside, Slipstream's briefs her cadre of dysfunctional Ascenticon warriors on their mission: to capture the building by any means necessary, and to leave no survivors. Tracer is first up, bisecting the first security 'bot and giving Shadow Striker's ground team the freedom to storm the inner facility and drop the next guard. The facility, Blackjack explains, is an abandoned relic from the Age of Expansion used to coordinate Titans...but as he explains, the group comes under fire from Headrush, the last member of the garrison. Hyperdrive easily takes him out, just in time for Slipstream and their secret asset Skystalker to arrive before any enemy reinforcements.
Using a specially-engineered data-bomb developed by Shockwave's inner scientists, the team are able to use Skystalker's cityspeaking talents to reach out into Cybertronian orbit, where the planet's Titan defense fleet lies dormant. Skystalker reaches out to Vigilem, rousing him from his long slumber—and, gradually, the awesomely powerful warrior comes back online, ready to carry out his new orders...
Featured characters
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Autobots | Ascenticons | Others |
|---|---|---|
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Quotes
"This planet, and this civilization... they are failing, sinking ever further from the light of our origins."
"I did not know you were a declinist, Heretech."
"I find evidence of that decline ever more persuasive. As a culture. As spiritual beings."
- — Heretech and Megatron
"In this case, they'd call it compensatory justice. But from our point of view, it's trouble."
- — Nautica
"Blackjack, tell Flamewar she can't call us that. It's stupid."
"I don't care what she calls us."
"Yes! There you are. Team Stream, it is!"
- — Hyperdrive, Blackjack, and Flamewar
"Headrush. Heh. See, Flamewar. That's funny."
"Don't you think he's a bit weird? I think he's a bit weird."
- — Hyperdrive and Flamewar
Notes
- First appearances: Brawn, Pipes, Astrotrain, Tracer, Skystalker, Vigilem
- Mentioned but not yet seen: Proxima
Continuity notes
- Crosscut was previously established to have worked with Nautica on an offworld peacekeeping mission in issue #12
- Heretech refers to the destruction of the Memorial Crater, which occurred in issue #9, and the killing of an immersant Titan in issue #14.
- Starscream was noted to have previously ousted Soundwave from the Intelligence Service in issue #14.
- Nautica had previously theorized that the Voin killed back in issue #5 was an important one; her fears were confirmed in issue #14, though she wasn't entirely sure what kind of response the Voin would utilize. The "asserter" seen here is accompanied by monstrous versions of the apelike creatures Cybertron's Voin have traditionally used and the crustaceans glimpsed in #12.
- Flamewar suggests that their new team could be the equivalent of "Strika's Heavies", a War of the Threefold Spark-era military unit that cameo'd in the prior issue.
- The orbiting Titan defense fleet was something first alluded to aaaaall the way back in issue #1, and later briefly glimpsed by Rubble in issue #3... and now it seems that foreshadowing is about to pay off in a big, big way...
Transformers references
- Starscream namedrops Proxima as an intellectual who'd been infatuated with Nautica in the past; she appeared in the pages of More than Meets the Eye as a member of Nautica's Camien sorority.
- Heretech announces that the Reversionists plan to leave Cybertron entirely; in addition to setting up the plot of the third arc of Galaxies, it also hearkens back to the Exodus from the original IDW continuity, a mass evacuation of pre-war Cybertron overseen by pious leader Dai Atlas and the eventual rise of the religious Circle of Light.
- Tracer takes out an unlucky generic security guard by slicing him in half with his rotors; his death is drawn to resemble Ambulon's demise in the pages of More than Meets the Eye, where he was bisected vertically by Pharma.
- Skystalker is confirmed to be a Cityspeaker, a profession that originated in the prior IDW continuity with Windblade... although given her security credentials it's unclear if Windblade herself is a Cityspeaker in this new universe.
- Holy crap! A treacherous servant of the Liege Maximo, Vigilem matched wits with Windblade in the pages of 2016's Till All Are One but his hubris proved his undoing as he ultimately failed to turn the Cityspeaker to his side. It's unclear how much of Vigilem's backstory will be maintained for this reboot—indeed, it's not clear if the Thirteen exist in this universe at all—but it's pretty darn clear that no matter what his backstory is like, Vigilem definitely spells trouble for Cybertron...
Other notes
- Originally solicited for January 15, this issue arrives two weeks late.
Covers (3)
- Cover A: Orion and Megatron, by Corin Howell
- Cover B: Future Autobots, by Hal Laren
- Retailer incentive cover: Bumblebee schematics in the style of a retro video game, by Hazen Backer]
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