Prologue: Dead End

Crystal City lay in ruins.

As a major campaign to take back the city had gone miserably wrong, with the main batallion of Autobot foot soldiers and Elite Guardsmen having been obliterated quickly, leaving a few platoons scattered to the city streets. Meanwhile, the Decepticons, having a head start in terms of manpower, quickly took to those same streets to wipe out what was left of the strike force.

Of the thousand Autobots that had arrived in Crystal City, only a few dozen remained. One such Autobot, with a flaming-red paint job completed with silver and gold highlights, rushed through the debris of the city, hoping to escape the carnage. Though technically a member of the Elite Guard, he was simply a cadet, having graduated from the Academy several Earth weeks ago. Granted, that fact was cleverly well hidden, both by the cadet's own mechanisms and the chaos that was happening around him, covered in scratches and dents from the combat, along with dust from camping out for the equivalent of three Earth days.

Though he had regrouped with several small battlegroups, they all fell one by one, until he was convinced that he was the last one left. Taking cover behind the ruins of a fallen building, his arm slowly transforming into a small blaster that, while its size was nothing bombastic, held enough firepower to down a Vehicon troop in a single shot. He had a small submachine gun strapped to his waist, but he was hoping that when he turned around, the small blaster would only have to be fired five times, and the emergency energon he had brought with him could be spared. But as he turned around, he looked in horror to see three dozen Vehicons pointing large cannons at his body.

In the three seconds it took him to to raise his hands in surrender, hoping that the drones would allow him to live in extract intelligence, everything went downhill for both sides.

A well-placed explosive blast incinerated the leadVehicon's helm, downing it and heavily injuring another. The cadet took advantage of the distraction and blasted a third Vehicon, downing it and taking cover as a silver-laced Cybertronian jet raced overhead, firing smart missiles at two dozen more, incinerating them into molten metal. Two more Cybertronians leaped from a large ATV, which separated into four smaller Cybertronians, each acting on their own accord. One of the two descending Autobots broke his fall by firing a glowing cable at a Vehicon, piercing his visor and retracting it to rip out his neural net. The other broke his own fall by releasing a pair of sonic blasts, spreading out in a shockwave to Finally, a large truck-like vehicle sped into the mix of bodies, smashing into two more Vehicons, finally wrapping up the skirmish. Transforming, the Autobot commander walked up to a Vehicon, who was struggling to escape.

"I am willing to give you a chance to leave with your life," the red and blue titan bellowed deeply, the authoritative tone he spoke in giving the young rookie a tingle in his servos. "I am only asking that you cooperate fully with assisting us."

"Burn in Unicron's blood, Prime!" The Vehicon spat, his visor preventing fluid from reaching the Autobot's face. Nonchalantly, the Prime relented, dropping the Vechicon and allowing him to run. Seconds later, a grenade landed and exploded, taking the Vehicon down in a ball of fire.

"Excellent work, Wheeljack," the Prime commended his fellow soldier, who leaped down, two glowing blue fins showing his trigger-happy chuckle. "Now, Blaster, communicate Iacon HQ. Tell them that we have retaken Crystal City... though at great cost."

Somberly, the red and yellow Autobot nodded, transforming into a boombox and sending an encrypted signal. The Cybertronian jet landed, transforming into a short but ammo-packed Autobot. "Optimus, I swept over the entire city with the Aerialbots. The 'Cons are falling back, and we've picked up several survivor groups. We're transporting them back to Iacon now."

"Very good, Silverbolt. Jazz, we must attend to our new arrival." Slowly, the Prime lumbered over and offered a large, yet comforting hand, and the young cadet slowly accepted it, regaining his footing.

"Are you unharmed, soldier?"

"Um... yes, sir... for the most part." The hot rod Autobot slowly brushed off the dust somewhat intentionally used as camoflauge, and saluted. "Reporting for duty, sir."

"Formalities are not required at this time, my friend. My name is Oprimus Prime, leader of the Autobot forces. What is your name, soldier?"

The yound Autobot gulped, before regaining his composure. "S-Smokescreen, Optimus. I... just got..."

"There is no need to explain yourself, Smokescreen." Optimus replied coolly, with a compassionate smile on his face. "I must request you come back with us to Iacon, and I am sure you would be more than welcome within our forces. Autobots, roll out!" With that, all of the other Autobots transformed and sped away.

Smokescreen watched the others drive off, then shrugged before transforming himself. "Yes, sir."

A/N: Hello, I'm QuilSniv, the Avenging Renegade. So, I'm jumping over to the Transformers fandom after a long, three-year career in the Tron fandom. This is a story that I've been working on for a few months, but never had the time nor the courage to attempt, since I mostly stick to smaller fandoms. But here we are, Transformers: End of Cybertron. It mostly consists of characters that mostly come inspired from Transformers Prime and the movies (maybe not so much that last one). What we have here is sort of a demo reel of the story, to reel people in and see what people think. That said, constructive criticism is insanely appreciated.

It's mainly going to focus on the War for Cybertron (inspired somewhat by the events of the game), and maybe they'll end up on Earth, but it'll be in the last third of the story.

But let's get one thing straight here: there aren't going to be any pairings here, at least not any that take up the spotlight, and absolutely no technorganics. It makes the humans feel way too forced to me, which was a big demotivating factor for me to see the movies. The story should be about the Transformers, not the humans. So they'll come much later, if barely at all.

I'll be posting the character list later on, once the story is published and I have a good roll going. Until then, peace guys!