Beast Wars Anonymous:

Only Human
by Spider Striker (scarletspider31@hotmail.com)

"Yess!"

He got up and danced around. "I finally got my web site up and running!" He sat back down, opened his journal document, and typed:

He stopped typing, scratched his head, and thought Man, that would be so cool to have Scarlet's powers and fight crime. Too bad I'm just a normal human and a real geek of one at that.

He looked at the ring on his finger. It was a red gem attached to a silver ring setting. He remembered how his grandmother died last year and left her favorite ring to him in her will. It was the only reason he had kept it.

As he remembered, the red gem on the ring glowed with blinding light and a raspy voice invaded his thoughts.

"You are needed," the voice said. The light of the ring expanded and scanned his room. It rested on the computer and brought up several files. It stopped when it found the information he used on his web site. "He will do," the voice spoke. Then the human boy collapsed on the floor.

Optimus Primal and Rhinox watched as a protoform formed in the empty stasis pod which sat upon the lab table. Rhinox typed in a command into the stasis' pod computer and the hatch opened. He typed in another command into the control panel on the table. Two mechanical arms moved to the pod and inserted themselves into the protoform.

Rhinox looked at Primal and asked "Are you sure you want to do this? This is an experiment never tried before."

"I have to," Optimus answered. "Megatron has too many soldiers now. We have to try and create sparks so we can even the odds."

Rhinox nodded and attached a wire to Optimus's chest and pressed the 'enter' key on the control panel. The stasis pod started to hum and slowly a spark started to form. Suddenly, Optimus cried out as an explosion ignited in his chest and the process shut down. The half spark was lost.

"Are you all right?" Rhinox asked as he helped Primal to his feet.

He groaned and answered "Y-yes. What happened?"

"The process was taking to much of your spark's energy. Your repair system had to stop it anyway it could."

"Well, that's just pr..."

Before he could finish, a surge of energy came down on the pod. The arms were forced away and the hatch closed. The computer started working at top speed, following alien commands.

"What the slag!" shouted Rhinox. He walked over to the pod and read the computer screen. He scratched his head and scanned the pod with his scanner. "This thing is growing a spark! By the looks of things it'll be Maximal, but it's glowing with temporal energy."

Optimus eyes grew wide with amazement when he heard the news of a spark. When he heard Maximal and temporal in the same sentence he activated his comm-link.

"Optimus to Blackbird."

"Yo!"

"Where are you?"

"In my quarters, why?"

"I need you to come down to the lab. We got something that may interest you. Optimus out."

When Blackbird got there Optimus and Rhinox told him what happened. "Whoa! Your telling me that this thing could be another Autobot?!?"

"Or Decepticon, or who know what else. But Rhinox has confirmed that it is a Maximal at this point," Optimus answered. "I want you to be his or her friend when he or she wakes up, seeing how you went through the same ordeal."

"No problem," Blackbird said.

Just then, the pod's computer said aloud "Process complete." The hatch opened and the new Maximal climbed out. He was all bright red, scarlet, except for some silver areas and huge white eyes. The areas were a belt-like thing that looked like the belt a super hero would wear and the others were identical sets of columns attached to each wrist. He had no mouth and his head was rounded. Two Maximal insignia were located on his shoulders. He was shaped like a human at peak physical condition. In other words, he was pumped.

He stood up and looked at his surroundings. He didn't notice the other Maximals until they answered his question "Where the Hell am I?"

"Your at Maximal base," Optimus answered. "I'm Optimus Primal. This is Rhinox and this is Blackbird. And you are..."

"Going crazy!" he shouted. "I finally get my site up and then my ring talks to me! IT TALKS! And now I'm here with Cy-Gor and the Rhino update and...and whoever the Hell he is!" He was about to scream, but fainted before he had the chance.

"Wow! Déjà Vu," Blackbird said with a grin on his face.

Rhinox attached the same device the Maximals used to learn about Blackbird to the sides of the new Maximal's head. Information from the new Maximal's data tracks came up and Rhinox scratched his head again. "That's odd."

"What is it?" asked Primal.

"The only information in his data tracks are that he's Maximal, he's to complete a mission and a bunch of useless info. Everything else is triple encrypted."

"Let me see," said Blackbird and read the information. "Simpsons, MIB, music, Internet, Grandma? I think he may be human."

"WHAT!?!" Rhinox and Optimus asked at the same time.

"Well," Blackbird said, "he mentioned he had a ring, human jewelry. He called you Cy-Gor, a character from a popular comic book. Same with Rhino. His data tracks list several parts of human culture, including 'Grandma.' "

Just then, the human/Maximal got up and disconnected the wires from his head. "And I'm a robot!" he said. When he saw how close Blackbird was, he pulled out his gun out of subspace and pointed at Blackbird's head. He seemed more surprised than Blackbird at this action.

" 'Guns aren't exactly friendly,' " Blackbird said quoting his friend Hot Rod.

Suddenly, he realized that these robots were no threat and he put his gun away. "You're Maximals?" he asked.

"Yes," answered Optimus. "And so are you. What's your name?"

"My head keeps telling me it's Spider Striker, but that's not it. I'm supposed to be a 16 year old human boy."

"Maybe you should tell us the last human memory you have," suggested Blackbird. "It might help."

As Spider Striker told his story and the three Maximals listened, no one noticed the spy camera transmitting the whole thing.

Darkbird listened to the new Maximal's story very closely. This new guy could prove useful. There's much more to him than just being a human, he thought. I've got to get Megatron interested in him somehow, or do I?

He was about to form a plan when he heard Scorponok run by yelling "MEGATRON! THERE'S A NEW MAXIMAL!"

"Well, that was easy enough," Darkbird said aloud and ran out of his quarters like the news was new to him and followed Scorponok.

Spider Striker was introduced to the rest of the rest of the Maximals who welcomed him (except for Rat Trap and Dinobot) and he heard the whole story of why they were here. A scan done by Rhinox revealed that he was very different from other Maximals and Predacons.

"So your saying I'm not just a robot, but a robot freak?" he asked.

"No. Just that you don't have a beast mode, you're immune to energon build up, and you have some abilities that the rest of us don't," Rhinox answered. "This was all done by whatever it was brought you here. Apparently, your design is based on that comic character you had on your computer."

Spider Striker held his head and said " 'Head...hurt. Need...Oreos.' " Then he looked up and asked "May I go outside and take a hike or something?"

"Go ahead. Blackbird, go with him," Optimus said.

"Ah, no offense, but I'd rather go alone. I'll stay out of trouble."

Optimus reluctantly agreed and Spider Striker went outside. Then everyone started to talk about him. "I like him," said Nightfox. "He's very polite and charming."

" 'Rehehehely?' " said Blackbird. " 'Now I've gotta kill 'im!' "

"You don't have anything to worry about," Nightfox assured him and gave him a peck on the cheek.

"Humans are weak," stated Dinobot.

"Weak or not we need all the help we can get," Optimus told everyone when he heard what Dinobot said.

"Yeess, you do, Primal. To bad he left so soon," Megatron said through the open sky hatch. He jumped in and blasted Rhinox and Rat Trap. He was followed by every Predacon flyer and they made short work of the unprepared Maximals. "Darkbird, let the other Predacons in. Waspinator and Buzz Saw, find the new Maximal and bring him to me. I want him functional."

Spider Striker sat in a tree and thought about what was happening. Why am I here? I avoided fighting all I could in school and when I did fight, I got my ass handed to me. How am I supposed to fight in a war?! The Scarlet Spider's matto and the voice entered his head.

"With great power must come great responsibility!"

"You are needed!"

Suddenly, he felt that something was coming. Then he heard Waspinator and Buzz Saw. He watched as the two giant hornets bumped into each other as they came closer. They were laughing gleefully. Then they transformed and stated talking.

"Radar zzazz that Human-Bot iz close," one said.

"But Buzz Zaw no see him."

You can't be serious, Spider Striker thought as he got out his gun.

That fight was over in two minutes.

Jetstorm, Power Pinch, Scorponok, and Drill Bit stood outside standing guard. They all pointed their weapons on Spider Striker as he walked out of the forest.

"Hey guys, what's shaking?" he asked.

"It's the new Maximal!" Scorponok said.

" 'Where? I just get so flustered when I meet a celebrity. I don't know what to say.' "

"How about 'good bye' " Scorpionok said as fired a missile at the Maximal.

Spider Striker jumped out of the way and said " 'I'm way ahead of you.' "

Drill Bit fired and Spider Striker just jumped out of the way again.

"Hold still would ya," Jetstorm demanded as he took a shot and Spider Striker dodged yet again.

" 'Well actually, no,' " the Maximal stated as he started attacking.

"We can take him! It's four against one," Power Pinch shouted as the Predacons attacked.

" 'Far as I'm concerned that means you're outnumbered,' " Spider Striker said as he blasted Power Pinch's head while doing a back flip and shooting cyber webbing from his wrist at Scorponok. The webbing held his missile launcher and the missile went off inside, putting him in stasis lock.

Jetstorm fired like crazy and Spider Striker leaped up out of the way and all the attack sent Drill Bit into stasis lock as well. Spider Striker landed on top of Jetstorm and gave him one good punch to the head and he stayed down.

The Maximals all sat in beast mode in the hold. They were trying to figure out how to get the Axalon back. Cheetor looked at the ceiling and saw Spider Striker crawling on it. Cheetor was about to call out, but Spider Striker silenced him. He jumped to the floor and deactivated the force field. "Miss me?" he asked

"Thanks," Optimus answered. "Now we just need to activate Sentinel and retake the base."

"That may not work," Blackbird pointed out. "The Preds will expect it and it won't work on Darkbird."

"What other choice do we have?" Rhinox asked.

Terminix searched the Maximal data base for the information Megatron wanted, but found it nowhere. He was about to try again when the alarm went off. He looked at the security screen and saw the hold was empty. Before he could tell Megatron the command room became a battle zone.

Spider Striker went for the main computer but was confronted by Spidertron. Spidertron fired his leg guns and Spider Striker fired back. Spider Striker was hit fell to the floor. Spidertron walked over top him and was about to finish the job when Spider Striker fired a small ball from his wrist. The ball hit Spidertron and exploded into cyber webbing, tying him up.

Spider Striker leaped up, pushed Terminix out of the way, and typed in the code Rhinox told him. Sentinel came online and blasted the Predacons.

"Agh!" Megatron shouted when he was hit. "Predacons retreat!" All the Predacons flew, climbed, or were carried out the sky hatch. All except for Darkbird, who was losing to Blackbird. Or was he? No one could tell because Darkbird had covered his red optics.

Spider Striker walked over to the brawl and pulled out another gun. He pointed one gun at each 'Bird's head. "Stop," he ordered.

They stopped fighting, stood side by side, and Spider Striker asked "What's the first thing I said when I came out of the stasis pod?"

"Where the Hell am I?" they answered at the same time.

"Oh, screw it!" Spider Striker said and blasted the one on the right.

Darkbird landed on the floor when he looked up he saw every Maximal had their weapon pointed at him. "Your contacts fell out," Spider Striker stated, letting him know that his eyes were red again.

Darkbird started laughing. He flew up and crashed through the ceiling, laughing all the way. The battle was over.

Spider Striker sat in his new quarters staring off into space. There was a knock at the door. "Come in," he said.

Blackbird walked in and said "You're confused as Hell, aren't ya?"

"How did you know?"

"I went through the same thing, only I was an Autobot. I came over to give you this and tell you if you ever want to talk, I'm right next door." He handed Spider Striker two disks.

"What are they?"

"One is a music disk. It can play any music you want. The other is a bunch of information from the 1990s. You can look up movies, people, all sorts of junk."

"Thanks. Can I ask you a favor before you go?" Spider Striker asked as he stood up.

"What?"

"Do you guys have fabric?"

20 minutes later Spider Striker was in his quarters again. He held in his hand a blue, hooded sweat shirt with no sleeves and a laser pen. He was drawing something on the shirt. As he did he thought Took long enough to find a sweatshirt. Last place I expected one to be was in Rat Trap's quarters and didn't expect to just give it to me. He held up the shirt to look at the spider he had drawn on the front. He nodded, stood up and put it on. Now I look just like Scarlet, and I'm gonna kick the slag out of those Preds!

Far away from the Beast Wars, the two beings watched Spider Striker. "He has proven to be a warrior," one said.

"True, but he was brought here for another purpose. One not as important, but important none the less."

"Very well, but again we must choose soon. For the sake of the universe."