ROBOT WAR 1989

On January the 1st, the Timestorm threatened to engulf Earth completely. The Wreckers and the Decepticon Mayhem Attack Squad were forced to unite to defeat Galvatron, though the Mayhem's leader Carnivac had orders to kill any Wreckers left standing after the battle. Meanwhile, a task force of Earthen Autobots prepared to do something about the cataclysmic situation, only to come under attack by the Nebulon Decepticons- they'd come for the Scorponok's Headmaster companion! In the middle of battle, six of the Autobots, including Optimus Prime, suddenly vanished to Limbo, replaced with time-jumping Autobots from 2009 led by Rodimus Prime. After an initial misunderstanding, the Autobots of 1989 & 2009, Scorponok's remaining troops and the newly-arrived Decepticons of 2009 (Soundwave and the Terrorcons) agreed to unite to battle Galvatron.

Meanwhile, the Wreckers and Mayhems tracked Galvatron to his base, only to end up fighting both him and Megatron II, as well as Scourge and the newly-reactivated Ravage. They were forced to retreat, and by the end of the day Roadbuster, Battletrap & the Deluxe Insecticons were dead, and only Springer, Carnivac, Catilla, Inferno and Broadside remained online. Scourge realised the Timestorm had to be stopped, meaning he, Galvatron and Cyclonus' corpse would have to go back to the future. He went to Fortress Sinister to retrieve the body, only to fall afoul of an insane Shockwave. Galvatron went insane under pressure of temporal causality and it took a lot to finally bring him down. Ravage managed to bring Shockwave back from the brink and he threw Cyclonus' body into the Timestorm after Scourge and Galvatron, saving the world. In the aftermath, the future Autobots vowed to destroy all their time machines once arriving home, and Megatron II & Ravage stole the Mayhem's ship and went off to Cybertron.

On the 12th of January, Starscream arranged a meeting between Scorponok's and Ratbat's Decepticons at Ratbat's Arctic hideout. After he manipulating Buster Witwicky into revealing Ratbat's plan to capture the Underbase, battle broke out between the two groups, allowing Starscream to make off with Scorponok's star cruiser and get to the Underbase first. He dumped Buster in the middle of the Arctic for the Autobots to find, so battle between them and both Decepticon groups would commence. After the Transformers realised how they were being played by Starscream, they rushed to beat him to the Underbase- but it was too late. Now with the powers of a god, Starscream destroyed Ratbat's "desert island" cruiser and took offline every Transformer sent against him (save Soundwave) that didn't contain any organic components (Headmasters, Pretenders and the like). Ratbat was killed by Scorponok, leaving him in full control of the Earthen Decepticons, and the Transformers gathered their wounded and dead.

The picture is a fan art by TMUK member Jack Lawrence.

Spike Witwicky, Headmaster for Fortress Maximus, decided to leave the Transformer war now his brother was safe. Scorponok, however, had him marked for assassination and sent Carnivac & Snarler after him with new Pretender shells. Spike managed to summon Fortress Maximus and saw them off, realising that the Autobot was part of him forever. After this, Carnivac and Catilla found the three Autobot survivors of the Time Wars, and discovered that they were all feeling disgruntled that their factions were seemingly ignoring them after what they'd been through. They formed their own independent group, the Survivors, and were joined by Skids, who'd finally returned from Limbo with the defeat of Galvatron. However, the Decepticon Survivors were now outcasts for fraternising with the enemy, and Snarler vowed to be among the group sent to have them killed.

With so many soldiers offline, the Autobots were outnumbered and outgunned. The Pretenders Cloudburst and Landmine were sent to Grand Central Space Station to buy much-needed components to assist repairs, only to end up getting involved in the dealings between the Dreadwing duo and the robot-eating Mecannibals. The Pretenders rescued Sky Lynx from the Mecannibals and turned their rage towards Dreadwing, causing the Powermasters to flee. 

Megatron II and Ravage finally arrived on Cybertron on March 29th, where they executed the pompous and useless ruling triumvirate and gained control of the planet. Simultaneously the real Megatron regained his mind in the Dead End and began to work secretly, gaining the support of the Sports Car and Air Strike Patrol Micromasters. He hired the Dreadwing duo to go to Earth and salvage the body of Starscream- they battled the Triggerbot team Backstreet, Override and Dogfight to get it, only to find it alive and wandering around, possessed by the Underbase- the Decepticons drained its power and left. Thanks to the Mecannibals pursuit, it took them a long time to get back to Cybertron.

Megatron II never rested. He attempted to both discover the identity of an Autobot spy and remove himself of the Pretender assassin Bludgeon, a threat due to his charisma and will to lead, by announcing Bludgeon the traitor and organising his execution. He found and executed the traitor, who wouldn't kill the Pretender in cold blood, but Bludgeon remained alive. Afterwards, he tried to win Backstreet over to the Decepticons by preying on his insecurity but Optimus thwarted him. Finally, in June 11th he fell prey to the Straxus influence within his mind and encountered the real Megatron, who'd come to execute him to prevent him going mad and slaughtering Decepticons. Megatron II realised the truth- he was not Megatron possessed by Straxus, but Straxus in a different body possessed by Megatron! With the help of the original, he killed himself to prevent Straxus from winning against the name of Megatron. The original left, as his plan required his survival to be unknown and thus he couldn't take control yet, and Ravage went back to Earth. The Transformers presumed Megatron finally dead, and a trio of elderly Decepticon generals took control temporarily until a new leader could be found.

On June 21st, the Micromaster Off Road and Race Car Patrols arrived from Cybertron to bolster the Autobot ranks. Their first mission was stopping a plot by the Decepticon Pretenders to create a storm near their New Jersey base and siphon the energy from it for Energon, in which the Micromasters were successful. The success went to their heads, however, and they decided to stay in New York to promote the Autobot cause independently by fighting crime and, in the case of Race Car Patrol leader Roadhandler, by becoming a popular wrestling star. 

On July 17th, Autobot detectives Nightbeat and Siren investigated the corpse of an unknown Autobot washed up on the Californian beach. They soon found that the corpse and its companions had been Autobot captives let loose on Earth as a test for the new Decepticon leader-in-training, the Mega-Pretender Thunderwing. He had to hunt down and kill all three captives to be proven worthy- Nightbeat and Siren managed to save one of the captives, Hosehead, and knock out the Mega-Pretender with a high-power explosive. 

In the latter half of August, Scorponok's Headmaster companion Zarak met up with Roadhandler, backed up by the Decepticon Air Strike Patrol Micromasters. He was threatened that unless he took a dive in his next fight to the Micromaster Stormcloud and thus cripple his chances of Autobot promotion, they would kill members of his fan club. Though Zarak and the Air Strike Patrol were routed by the Autobot Micromasters, Roadhandler ended his wrestling career and broke off every relationship he had with humans before rejoining the Autobot army, so no one would remain Decepticon targets.

After a minor incident in which the Decepticon Doubledealer conned both Optimus and Scorponok out of Energon and into fighting, Thunderwing regained consciousness and went on a rampage, before a Decepticon taskforce composed of Ruckus, Crack-Case, Quake, Flamefeather and Windsweeper arrived to take him back to Cybertron; he forced them into joining him on an attack on the Ark to gain revenge for his humiliation. The attack was repulsed, but his ruthlessness impressed the ruling Council and so he was made into the new Decepticon leader. One of the first things he did was to end all neutral territory, such as Maccadam's Old Oil House.

On September the 2nd, Earth was attacked by a berserker and supremely powerful robotic warrior called Deathbringer, its name shared with that of a being from an Cybertronian religious text. It was discovered to have been a Deathbringer mechanoid, part of a series designed for euthanasia work, that had come into contact with the missing Creation Matrix (lost with the original body of Optimus) and been recreated as more powerful but with warped programming, viewing all life as necessary to be killed. In destroying Deathbringer, the Autobots lost their only link to the missing Matrix and also realised that the Matrix may have perverted...

On September 10th, Megatron made his move. Ratchet was abducted from the Ark by the Sports Car Patrol, who planted explosives on the ship- if he didn't comply with Megatron's orders, his patients would all be killed. The Autobot army was on Earth, distracted by the Air Strike Patrol, who then set up a battle between the Autobot army and Scorponok's Decepticons. Starscream's corpse was finally dropped off by Darkwing and Dreadwind, and Ratchet was ordered to use Pretender technology to bring him back; once refunctioning, the brainwashed Starscream was sent to Earth in his Pretender shell to kill off Scorponok and Prime, thereby giving Megatron the control of the Earthen Decepticons. However, Ratchet fought back, using Pretender technology to revive Grimlock, Jazz and Goldbug (turned into Bumblebee again) and teleporting the explosives off the Ark and into Megatron's base- the resulting explosion, occurring near an open Space Bridge, seemingly killed Ratchet and Megatron. Starscream's brainwashing wore off and he surrendered to Scorponok. 

The result of Ratchet's death left Optimus in a state of depression that would last for months and the newly revived Autobots stayed behind on Cybertron to assist the rebellion, but the war went on. On Cybertron, Maccadam's Old Oil House was attacked by two Mecannibals who were tracking down the Dreadwing duo- they were defeated by the Autobot warrior Quickswitch. Starscream had a major bout of insecurity before before smashing up three Autobots made him realise he feared by all. An initiation rite on Cybertron gone wrong led to the Autobot Tailgate trapped in the Underworld, fighting off the homicidal Mutants, before destroying them all. The battle in the Underworld awoke three vicious and ancient mechanical "Demons" that slept on a lower level of Cybertron. The Demons killed and devoured several Decepticons and drove the Micromaster Seawatch comatose. A combined force of Transformers fought them to no avail, until Xaaron took advantage of the Demon's ability to feed on energy by overloading them on pure Energon. Ominously, it was suggested that hundreds of Demons remained under Cybertron and that if they attacked in force, no Transformer would survive...

 On Christmas Eve, the Pretender Longtooth sent to the Ark a fragment of the Matrix that he'd been shamefully hording for the past 4 million years, in the hope an Autobot could be revived. Optimus Prime, temporarily revived from his depression, decided instead to give it to the planet Earth, to repair the damage done to the environment by the Transformer war.