Tales of the Intermezzo - Regret
                       A Transformers Universe Story
                     copyright 2001 by Dave Van Domelen
                     based on properties owned by Hasbro
===========================================================================

     "intermezzo - n. A brief entertainment between two acts of a play."
          - American Heritage Dictionary

     "I regret everything."
     I said that once to a Maximal, and it was no mere witticism.  It was the
truth.
     It should not be said that I bear remorse for my actions...far from it!
I embrace them.  But everything I do arises from the very fact of my
existence.
     And THAT I bear remorse for.  An ill-advised experiment with ill-omened
results, I knew myself to be a monster from the moment I came online.  No
atrocity was horrible enough to exceed my own expectations for myself.
     I regret that the universe spawned me.  All else is mere detail.  I
would not have wished myself on any world, but given the fact of my life, who
was I to deny destiny?
     Now I struggle for my life, and I find myself asking: why do I do this?
Life is pain, eternal life is eternal pain.  And the pain of my own life has
been sublimely exquisite.
     The energon shard hovers a mere handspan from my spark.  Its raw and
savage energy would have dissolved any normal essence already, yet the pain
this causes me barely registers above the day to day agony of my existence.
I can feel my fingers grinding against the shard as my old companion and
enemy desperately tries to drive it home.
     Such a hero, in his own mind.  Oh, he talks savagely about vengeance and
spurns the help the other Maximals might have given him, but he has the fatal
flaw of all heroes.
     Depth Charge CARES.  It's not wounded pride over his failure to protect
his charges from my actions.  It's not anger over being insulted.  He cares
that I harm others, and he is willing to die so that his own life is the last
I take.
     Such heroic nonsense, as a great man once said.
     The last life I will take is MINE, as I free myself from the bonds of
destiny.
     But...perhaps this weapon crudely shattered from raw crystal could help
us both attain our goals?  We both wish me dead, after all.
     I nearly cackle with glee as a wicked thought bubbles to the surface of
my mind.  Simply fighting until I die would be too kind an act by such as me.
     And so I let go, surrendering myself to his mercy.
     I stop fighting.
     I give up.
     And he pauses for but an instant, realizing the terrible vengeance I am
unleashing on him.  The vengeance of choice.
     He can capture me, take me to the justice I so richly deserve, and risk
that I will break free once more...and we both know I will.
     He can kill me himself, slaying a surrendered and defenseless foe,
becoming a murderer.  And no matter how often he justifies his actions as
being for the greater good, he will know that he became a man who will slay
the helpless.  He will know this as long as he lives...which may not be long,
given the amount of explosive energon crystals surrounding us.
     He makes his choice and drives the point of his weapon home.
     My soul laughs coldly and bitterly as it is blasted apart.

              *              *              *              *

     I do not know which master to follow anymore.  The darkness in my spark
tells me to obey Megatron, for in that way I may spread the most pain and
sorrow among the innocent.  It especially glories in the orders to use my
link to the Other to hurt him.  Somehow I know that the Other *wants* the
pain, embraces it as a lover, even as he protests the ignominy of being used
as a puppet.
     But a question nags at me during the spaces in the darkness, times I
cannot call "light" except by contrast with the dark evil that encircles it.
     "Where is the honor in this?"
     It is as if two souls battle for dominance in my frame.  One dark and
vile, but touched by a tiny bit of light.  The other bright and terrible like
a star, yet tarnished by darkness.  A Maximal become Predacon and a Predacon
become...something beyond labels and factions.
     Even now, aboard the legendary Decepticon warship, the two souls
struggle for the upper hand.
     Obedience?
     Honor?
     How am I to follow the dictates of my heart when I do not know what
those dictates *are*?
     Suddenly, a shock batters the hull, but I hardly feel it in the wracking
of my soul.  The battle for my very being has reached a climax, and I
feel...memories.  But not just facts and opinions, like datatrax, I FEEL the
memories!  The darkness flies from me like a routed army, leaving emptiness
that is not darkness, emptiness that the starsoul burning in me can fill!
     Honor burns brightly in my core, but I hide it behind the old sneer.  I
know what I must do now, but I must bide my time.
     I may die once more before the day is done, but I would die a thousand
times if it meant doing so with honor.
     With no regrets.

               *              *              *              *

     I note, to my apparently eternal regret, that the Maximal fools wrought
even better than they had hoped.  Even without a body, my spark retains
memories and awareness, as Starscream's was reputed to have done.
     Yet...I died, did I not?  My spark dispersed, no fragment large enough
to hold even half a memory remained.  I felt the shard of energon pierce the
thin luminous membrane and tear it open.
     Of course!
     The other half.  The piece of my soul that HE tore out and placed in his
foul creation.  Foul, of course, because a part of my own hideous spark went
into its creation, but also foul because of the delicious desecration that
went into it.  A revenant cloned from a former ally who had become an enemy,
to be used against those the dead one had called friends.  It was one of the
pretender's few acts that impressed even me with its horror.
     Now, somehow, that other half has been freed.  Perhaps the revenant has
been slain.  Or he could not hold onto his part of my spark once the
remainder had been sundered.
     So.  I live.
     After a fashion.

              *              *              *              *

     It is a species of fish that will come to be called a Coelocanth in the
distant future.  It lives in the deeps, an ancient hunter.
     A thin, guttering point of light attracts its attention, fitting a set
of criteria in its limited brain that labels it "something to try to eat."
It is too simple a creature to know any emotion more complicated than the
hunger that now drives it.
     The point of light does not move to flee, and in moments it is in the
fish's belly.
     A new emotion dimly fills the creature's mind.  It does not understand
this emotion or know why it should feel the sensation.
     But it feels regret.

               *              *              *              *

     Lurking deeper than any surface-dweller would ever go, the giant squid
prowled its territory.  Not so much for food, although it certainly hunted as
it swam, but for rivals.  Only by keeping rivals at a distance could the
squid be certain that he would have enough to eat.
     It did not think abstractly, of course.  It did not have a clear idea of
cause and effect.  But it knew quite clearly that outside of certain specific
circumstances, it was BAD to find another of its kind nearby.
     Something was wrong.
     A rival!
     But...not a rival?
     As the squid came closer to the interloper, it realized there were
differences.  A great hunter and one of the best thinkers of the deeps, it
felt momentary confusion where a less intelligent beast would have
immediately have fought or fled.
     The confusion cost the squid its life as a hard tentacle wrapped itself
around its body, drawing the squid into a shining maw stronger than any
normal beak.
     The squid died, but its body lived under the command of another, slowly
turning from flesh into something the squid's old mind had no concept for.
     Metal.

               *              *              *              *

     Gilmer moved silently, carefully.  The humans had laughable technology
in most respects, but the paranoia of the "Cold War" fifty or so of their
years ago, combined with the depredations of the Great War's campaigns on
this planet, had led to the development of some very sophisticated detection
technology.
     Blood and Dauros may have been content to remain in their hiding places,
waiting for the call to action.  But when that call came, Gilmer knew he
would want more than a mere two allies.  The Cybertrons had no doubt left
some behind despite their noble promises, correctly anticipating that their
enemies would do the same.
     And the Cybertrons would be gathering allies.  Humans were puny, of
course, and primitive.  But not totally negligible.  If nothing else, the
mass of humans could distract Gilmer and his fellows from their goals.
     So Gilmer wanted his own expendable allies.  Call them pawns, to be
honest.
     His sensors, placed along the bottom of the sea, had given him
tantalizing hints that there might be allies down here who could be more than
throwaway pawns.  Not Nergal's Atlanteans, of course.  With their city
destroyed decades ago, that people had scattered and become as useless to the
Destron cause now as they had been to the Decepticons then.
     But, as the maps humans drew once said, "Here be monsters."
     Metallic monsters.
     Gilmer stopped and focused attention on his sensors.
     He was being surrounded.
     He fought down panic.  "I wanted strong allies, this is not the time to
regret finding them," he muttered to himself.
     "It is always time to regret," came a voice from directly in front of
Gilmer.  Eyes glowed redly and sonar indicated the shape of a tremendous
turtle...or tortoise?  Hard to be sure.  What *was* certain was that it was
metallic.
     He composed himself.  "I am Gilmer of the Destron army.  I come seeking
recruits."
     "Destron, eh?" the turtle chuckled.  "How the eons pass quickly.  Yes, I
know of the Destrons...Decepticon faction dedicated to creating a new
Decepticon homeworld and then conquering or even destroying the Autobots,
Maximals and Predacons of Cybertron.  What do you want, specifically?"
     "Allies.  No one believes the war on this world is truly over.  It's
just an intermission.  The stinking Cybertrons are, as is their habit,
gathering allies among the humans.  I seek someone who can negate this
advantage."
     "Indeed.  A chance to leave my stygian depths behind, sow panic and
fear, and cause anguish to heroes?"  Hundreds of metallic sea creatures swam
into the range of Gilmer's sonar sweeps.  Many copies of the same four or
five bodies, armies of different species.  All, apparently, under the command
of this strange and knowledgable turtle.  "Very well, I accept," the stranger
said.  His body glowed slightly and a Destron brand appeared on it.
     "You won't regret it," Gilmer promised.
     The turtle chuckled.  "Of COURSE I will, Destron.  But I try not to let
that stop me...."

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Author's Notes:

     Yes, it's Beast Wars meets Masterforce!  Gilmer, aka Submaurauder, was
one of the Destrons (Decepticons...I made up the subfaction idea) left on
Earth after the events of Headmasters 2010.
     In Masterforce, the Seacons were actually hordes of mindless drones plus
one unique and intelligent leader, Tatra (Snaptrap).  They blew up real good.
All Tatra needed was one each of the various types to become King Poseidon
(Piranacon).
     So, I was thinking about King Poseidon and wondered where the Destrons
got such an unlimited supply of Seacon drones so quickly after coming out of
deep hiding.  I also considered that Rampage's spark was still indestructable
and had previously survived carving up by an energon blade.
     Thus was the kernel of this story born.  Rampage's spark was dispersed
and entered the bodies of various marine life.  By the ideas of Beast Wars
Neo's manga, a spark entering an organic can make it into a Transformer under
certain circumstances.
	Then, while at the Big Broadcast of 2001, I saw Nemesis again (okay,
after the Big Broadcast at the organizer's house).  It got me thinking about
Dinobot II's conversion.  If he got the whole of Rampage's spark, he would
have become MORE evil, not less.  I decided that Dinobot's original spark had
been slowly drawn to the cloned body, and was fighting a struggle for
dominance against the half of Rampage's spark.  When half of that spark was
dispersed, Dinobot's own spirit was able to win the battle and boot out the
rest of Rampage.  An alternative to accepting "Dark Glass" as canon,
essentially.  
     From there, the half of Rampage became Tatra and started marshalling the
armies formed from the other part of his soul....