Echoes and Fragments
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 Wow, a new and totally original cover for this story! | |||||||||||||
| "Echoes and Fragments" | |||||||||||||
| Publisher | Transformers Collectors' Club | ||||||||||||
| Published in | Ask Vector Prime | ||||||||||||
| First published | February 10, 2016 | ||||||||||||
| Written by | Jim Sorenson | ||||||||||||
| Continuity | Generation 1 cartoon continuity, GoBots | ||||||||||||
| Page count | 24pp | ||||||||||||
A familiar conflict is hijacked by Gong and Sideways, bringing in some extra-dimensional visitors and forcing Vec-Tor to intervene.
Synopsis
[edit]Part 1: The Gathering Storm
[edit]On the eve of a momentous confrontation between the Autobots and Decepticons, Sideways encounters Gong in Maccadam's Old Oil House. The two strike up a plot to merge the reality they are currently inhabiting with a Gargent stream, to see how mixing GoBots into the equation changes things, prompting the bartender to get in touch with his brother, Vec-Tor, to ensure the safety of reality. Their machinations cause the Battle of Autobot City to be fought between Autobots and Renegades, with Sideways later changing it to a battle between Guardians and Decepticons. Despite some minor changes, events unfold as expected, with Leader-1 and Megatron gravely wounding each other and the Decepticons in retreat.
Part 2: To the Death—And Beyond!
[edit]Further machinations from Sideways destabilize reality even more, resulting in hybrid crews of Autobots/Guardians and Decepticons/Renegades participating in the aftermath of the battle. Megatron, Crasher, and Spoons are jettisoned from Astrotrain and encounter Unicron. They are subsequently upgraded into Galvatron, Fracture, and Deadlift. They first interrupt Zero's coronation and later attack Major Mo's forces on Earth. Kup and Hot Rod crash on Antares III, and Major Mo and his crew limp to the planet of rock to repair their damaged ship. On Gobotron, Sideways is captured.
Part 3: Terror on Two Worlds!
[edit]Vector Prime learns the source dimension interfering with his own and sets off for it. Hot Rod and Kup encounter the Master Renegade and his Monster GoBots on Antares III, while the Dinobots meet the RoGuns. Hot Rod and Kup learn about Unicron from Crank, the last survivor of Planet Zi. Galvatron tracks Major Mo and his crew to Quartex, retrieving the Guardian Matrix of Leadership and leaving the Autobots and Guardians stranded without a ship, surrounded by hostile Rock Lords.
Part 4: Matrix Quest!
[edit]Sideways escapes his captors and makes his way back to Gong on Cybertron, where they ambush Vector Prime. With the help of the RoGuns and Dinobots, Hot Rod and Kup defeat the Master Renegade and depart Antares III. The Rock Lord attack on the wounded Autobots and Guardians is thwarted by the timely arrival of Hot Rod, Kup, and friendly Rock Lords. The combined forces set forth for Cybertron, only to encounter an enraged Unicron intent on dismembering their entire world. Hot Rod confronts Galvatron, but is unable to open the Guardian Matrix until Vector Prime can drive off Sideways and restore the universe to its natural state. Unicron is defeated, Vector Prime is relieved... and Sideways ends up being menaced by an enraged Gong, unhappy at being used as Sideways' pawn.
Featured characters
[edit](Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Autobots | Decepticons |
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| Others |
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Quotes
[edit]"Tote that barge!" "Lift that bale!"
- —Crain Brain and Spoons have a different attitude towards breaching Autobot City walls than the Insecticons.
"Autobot buffoons! Time to eat beak!"
"Not this time, Renegade slime!"
- -Re-Volt and Blaster trade familiar, yet suitably GoBotified, taunts.
"Why throw away your life so recklessly?"
"The only thing I'm throwing away will be the key, after I lock you up for good!"
- —Megatron and Leader-1 prepare for an epic smackdown.
"They're closing on us!"
"Yup, like the Quick-Steps of Zeeros!"
"How'd you beat them?"
"I'm trying to remember, we lost a lot of good Autobots on Quartex... oh, yeah, we re-routed the gravity dampeners!"
- Hot Rod and Kup have a familiar conversation with a GoBots twist.
Hot Rod "Cybertron. We've got to get to Cybertron!"
Solitaire "Quartex is not without recourse when it comes to space travel." (points to a gleaming tower of crystal)
Kup "That's a ship?"
Hot Rod "Who cares, as long as it flies?"
- Familiar dialogue, slightly later in the story.
"And you think I fear death? I WELCOME death! The sweet embrace of oblivion is a nectar most dear to me."
- Sideways embraces his inner nihilist.
Notes
[edit]- There is a large number of substitutions, with a Guardian or Renegade temporarily taking the place of an Autobot or Decepticon. These substitutions include, but are certainly not limited to:
- Cy-Kill for Megatron (naturally)
- Fitor for Shockwave (ever-loyal #2)
- Zero for Starscream (ambitious, disloyal underling)
- Dr. Go for Soundwave (the scientist/creator)
- Leader-1 for Optimus Prime (again, naturally)
- Major Mo for Ultra Magnus (seasoned veteran soldier)
- Tri-Trak for Hot Rod (impulsive young hotshot)
- Blaster (the GoBot) for Blaster the Autobot (snort!)
- Puzzler for Devastator (combiner for combiner)
- Courageous for the Dinobots (the heavy hitters)
- Nick and A.J. for Daniel (two for the price of one!)
- Matt and Anya for Spike (GoBots had more humans than Transformers, didn't it?)
- Turbo for Jazz (seems apt)
- Scooter for Bumblebee (kid appeal)
- The RoGuns for Wheelie (annoying small companions)
- Space Hawks for Autobot frigates (smaller ships)
- Command Center for Autobot shuttles (larger ships)
- Antares III for Quintessa
- The Master Renegade and the Monster GoBots for the Quintessons and their minions
- Quartex for Junkion
- The Rock Lords in place of the Junkions
- Some events unfold differently, due to the substitution of GoBots for Transformers. Notably:
- Cy-Kill spares Ironhide during the attack on the ship, thinking he might find some use for the Autobot
- Nick warns Hot Rod to avoid Kup's barrier, leading him to dodge around it.
- Leader-1 never considers killing Megatron after the conclusion of their battle.
- Tri-Trak can't bear the guilt of helping to kill Leader-1, and leaves his deathbed early. This causes the Matrix to fall to the floor.
- Major Mo is less flustered by the death of Hot Rod and Kup than Ultra Magnus was.
- Major Mo willingly surrenders the Matrix to Galvatron in exchange for the lives of his crew, and is subsequently spared (though heavily damaged) by Galvatron.
- Several GoBots characters are mentioned, but do not appear in the story. These include Zod, Scales, General Newcastle of UNECOM, Steamer, Quick-Step, Snarlie Narlie and various other types of Narlies, and the Last Engineer.
- Many GoBots playsets and vehicles also appear, including the Command Center, Thruster, and Space Hawk class of ships, the Gobotron Fortress, and the Stonehead, Rock Pot, and Stone Wing Rock Lord accessories.
- In fact, nearly every GoBots character is referenced at some point in the story, with the glaring (and one would assume deliberate) exclusion of the cast of Spatiotemporal Challengers. Out of the nine Guardians and Renegades to appear in those stories, only Man-O-War appears here as a "Hi-and-Die!" character.
- When the GoBots show up in art, they are usually just 'TransTech-ish' versions of their Hanna-Barbara selves. The exceptions (not counting Deadlift and Fracture) are Snoop in the Renegade scene, who is a redecoed Armada Terradive; Crane-Brain, Crasher, and Screwhead on the reformatting scene, who are modelled on Combiner Wars Hook, Daytonus, and Unite Warriors Nosecone respectively.
Transformer references
[edit]- The entire story is a retelling of The Transformers: The Movie with GoBots elements jumbled in.
- The story is broken into four parts, with each part sharing a title with an issue of IDW's Transformers: The Animated Movie comic adaptation.
- Gong identifies Sideways as hailing from the Viron Cluster. Entries in the AllSpark Almanac and Facebook editions of Ask Vector Prime have previously identified the dimension-hopping Herald of Unicron Sideways as having a presence in Robots in Disguise universe(s) before participating in the events of the Unicron Trilogy cartoons.
- The bartender at Maccadam's Old Oil House has a brotherly connection with Vec-Tor/Vector Prime, whom he mentally contacts from across the multiverse to warn about Sideways. This ties in with the theory of Maccadam secretly being one of the Thirteen, which was originally mentioned in the Transformers: The Ultimate Guide book, then later referenced in the Ask Vector Prime Facebook hinting at Maccadam secretly being Alchemist Prime of the Thirteen, and finally canonized in the Cyberverse cartoon episode "The Other One", in which that cartoon's version of Maccadam revealed his true identity as Alchemist Prime.
- Crasher and Spoons are rebuilt by Unicron into Fracture and Deadlift... toys that were designed as homages to the original GoBots characters.
- Likewise, the Sweeps are repurposed from the Dirt Boss toy, and Fracture's "armada" comes from Fracture's toy in Crasher's alternate white color scheme.
- Kup tames a Dactyl, a Sharkticon-analog, and names it "Gnaw".
Real-world references
[edit]- Crain Brain and Spoons sing a fragment of "Old Man River" as they breach Autobot City.
- The Lithones are replaced with Starriors.
See also
[edit]- Echoes and Fragments at TFWiki's Ask Vector Prime Facebook archive
