Linkage Part 3
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| Linkage Part 3 | |||||||||||||
| Publisher | Columbia Music Entertainment | ||||||||||||
| First published | June 25, 2003 (with Micron Legend 3 DVD) | ||||||||||||
| Writer | Hirofumi Ichikawa | ||||||||||||
| Artist | Hirofumi Ichikawa | ||||||||||||
| Letterer | ??? | ||||||||||||
| Editor | ??? | ||||||||||||
| Continuity | Armada cartoon | ||||||||||||
The Mini-Cons are attacked while investigating a mysterious Cybertronian shuttle landing.
Synopsis
On the Deccan Plateau in India, the Super Stunt Team, Stella, and Rollbar (who has recently been released from his Mini-Con storage panel stored in Redline's chest) scope out a recently landed spaceship from Cybertron. Rollbar and Flat-Out are sent to scout ahead and determine if its pilot is an Autobot or Decepticon. If it's Autobot, Stella will act as interpreter and try to negotiate for technology that would help the Mini-Cons establish their own free colony. If it's a Decepticon, then they will all teleport out of there.
However, when Rollbar and Flat-Out move away to investigate, the others are attacked by two Mini-Cons, Top Gear and Midship, who are backed up by a squad of Fixer Bugs. Midship destroys their teleportation device and gets one hand around Redline's neck, promising to "debug" them all so they no longer dream of freedom.
Flat-Out notices something's going on, and Rollbar then notices they're not alone either...
Featured characters
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Free Mini-Cons | Unicron | Humans |
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Quotes
"We knew you were nothing but a bunch of defectives who can't do anything but figure out how to run away!"
- —Midship doesn't have a very high opinion of his quarry.
"...I don't recall any Mini-Con ever being such a slagmouth!"
- —Redline reciprocates.
Notes
- This comic was available only with the third volume of the Micron Legend DVD in Japan, along with the exclusive Midship toy. Later pressings of the DVD did not include either.
Transformers references
- This story serves to explain where Rollbar came from, as he just kind of popped up with no announcement in the cartoon. Of course, that ultimately began to happen a lot in the show, so "Linkage" didn't make a habit of this kind of thing.
- Rollbar notices the shuttle has a cloaking device. This bit of seemingly pointless info actually pays when we find out who the ship's occupant is next issue.
- Stella mentions that the larger Transformers cannot speak the Mini-Con binary language. This is touched on throughout the cartoon; only those who have formed a psychic link with a Mini-Con can understand one.
- Midship gives a cryptic message on the Mini-Cons' "fate". This is, of course, a reference to the Mini-Cons being created as tools of destruction by Unicron (at least in this reality), though the comic and cartoon would not reveal this fact until later.
- The Mini-Con storage panel Top Gear pulls out is the one formed in the previous issue, from a captured Mini-Con.
Miscellaneous trivia
- Again, the villains and their devices remain unnamed. Just as with Top Gear, the comic came with the Midship toy, so owners were not left in the dark on that score.
