The Return of Blurr
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| "The Return of Blurr" | ||||||
| Original presentation | 12:00pm June 21, 2015 (BotCon) | |||||
| Written by | Marty Isenberg | |||||
| Continuity | Animated cartoon continuity | |||||
While on a field trip to the Metroplex with her classmates, Sari stumbles upon a certain incapacitated Autobot Intelligence agent.
Synopsis
Sari Sumdac, having joined her Autobot friends on Cybertron to learn more about her heritage, is joining Arcee's class on a field trip to the Metroplex. While Arcee welcomes her to the group, her classmates Nightbeat, Hosehead, and Siren are a bit hung up on her techno-organic nature. As the class enters the Metroplex, Sari gets out a burger and cup of soda from Burger Bot, which her father has sent her via the SpaceBridge. Her classmates are openly disgusted by the Burger Bot fare and the idea of anyone ingesting it.
Embarassed, Sari decides to quietly dispose of her soda cup in a disposal hatch, but she loses her balance and tumbles down the chute along with it, unnoticed by Arcee or her classmates. Sari lands in a dark room, on top of a pile of trash and debris, and touches a compacted metal cube. The cube then begins to glow and starts speaking, revealing itself as Blurr. While Blurr very quickly recaps how he ended up in this state, Sari realizes that some lingering AllSpark energy from when she upgraded herself must have reactivated Blurr.
Sari searches for an exit and comes across an access panel. Making use of her ability to communicate with machines, she attempts to use the panel to open a door. She succeeds, but in doing so also inadvertently awakens an energy-based being, which the narrator reveals to be Kremzeek.
Meanwhile, Arcee takes a headcount once her group reaches the Council chamber, finally noticing that Sari is missing. An alert sounds, saying there's an intruder in the recycling center, and Arcee takes it as a clue to Sari's whereabouts.
The scene cuts back to Sari and Blurr, who have ended up on a conveyor belt in the Central Cybertronian Recycling Plant that leads to a variety of nasty machines designed to reduce recyclables to scrap. Blurr informs Sari that the plant has thankfully been non-operational since the Great War, but unfortunately Kremzeek zaps into the machinery and reactivates it. Blurr voices an adamant desire to avoid repeating his compacting incident--or facing a smelter. Sari attempts to communicate with the machinery and discovers Kremzeek's presence. Kremzeek in turn lashes Sari to the conveyor belt to prevent her escape and trap her and the Blurr Cube on a course to the furnace.
All hope seems lost, and the narrator pauses for dramatic effect...before revealing that Arcee's group has made it just in time. Using Hosehead's hoses, Arcee's laser blades, Siren's sonic power, and Nighbeat's adhesive-spewing pellets, the team frees Sari and the Blurr Cube and destroys the machinery. The narrator laments that the scene would have looked fantastic in animation, if only Season 4 had been produced.
Blurr, in typical rapid fashion, recaps the story so far for the rest of the group. When Arcee hears of the being made of pure energy, she recalls info from her intel days and identifies Kremzeek as a Decepticon Trojan program that will continue to jump from system to system until it is contained. Sari realizes that the plant's machinery is now void of Kremzeek's presence, but it turns out that's because it has jumped into Nightbeat. The Kremzeek-controlled Nightbeat attacks Sari and takes off in vehicle mode. As it conveniently states, it's headed for Fortress Maximus, the Cybertronian defense hub. Arcee is able to close the security doors and cut off Kremzeek's exit just in time, while letting the team know that an invasion of Fortress Maximus' systems could destroy the entire planet.
The Kremzeek-possessed Nightbeat attacks Arcee, and she deflects with her laser swords, which she reveals were a gift from Ratchet. Cornered, Kremzeek jumps from Nightbeat into Siren, using his sonic abilities to blast a hole in the wall of the building. When Hosehead traps Kremzeek's host body with foam from his hoses, Kremzeek jumps bodies once more (this time into Hosehead), and flees through the hole. Sari pursues Kremzeek on a jetpack she produces from her conveniently appearing scooter and catches up to it in a tunnel. However, just as she grabs its host, it leaps from Hosehead into her jetpack, blasting off toward Fortress maximus on its own.
Hosehead laments that they'll never catch Kremzeek in time, but he gives Sari an idea. She connects the Blurr Cube to her backpack and somehow manages to infuse herself with Blurr's abilities. Arcee latches onto Sari, and the three of them zoom off after Kremzeek. Blurr remarks that this phenomenon is probably stretching the limits of credibility. They zip past Cheetor and Sideswipe, establishing the timing of this story as some point during "The Stunti-Con Job."
Featured characters
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
Notes
- The cast:
- Brian and the two Lauras were the winners of the So You Think You Can Voice Act? auditions held earlier in the day.
- This story takes place during the events of "The Stunti-Con Job".
- The live script reading was accompanied by five illustrations projected on the screen, with lineart by Naoto Tsushima and colors by Josh Perez.
