Transformers: The Last Knight rewrite

Chapter 3: Verity

Abraham Dante orders the walkers to open fire on the Autobots, followed by one walker blowing Bumblebee up to pieces. Dante smirks at Lennox, telling him "looks like your little autobot pal is a goner, William. of course, the only good alien is a dead one" as he whips out his twin pistols. Lennox then aims his gun at Dante, telling him "that's not true! the Autobots aren't monsters, their bodies may be made of metal but they have a soul just like us".  Dante tells Lennox "you know what you are, William? you're a traitor to your kind, THEY brought THEIR war to our planet and made a mess out of it! if they didn't, I would still have two arms. It is the job of the Initiative to avenge those lives who were lost during the invasion that happened 10 years ago, and make sure nothing like that ever happens again. and the only way we can do that is to kill every last alien fugitive on this planet and reclaim the planet Earth for humanity". Dante's speech is interrupted when Bumblebee's arm launches itself into the air with his plasma cannon and flies past Abraham Dante knocking him over. Bumblebee's parts reassemble followed by Bumblebee blasting the walkers with his stingers followed by the other Autobots joining in on the action, Bulkhead smashing walkers with his wrecking ball while Drift slices at the legs with his katanas and Crosshairs takes out a couple with his pistols until all the walkers are destroyed. a pair of Initiative soldiers help Dante back up on his feet. we then hear a loud voice shout "HEY! LEAVE THEM ALONE!" followed by a pair of vehicles arriving on the scene, a red-and-gold Ford GT40 and a green vintage 1950s pickup truck. Cade turns his head to see Verity Carlo hop out of the back of the pickup and recognizes her as the girl that Lennox was talking about. Abraham Dante then aims both of his pistols at Verity, telling her "there you are! you're the kid that's been causing us trouble. you're not escaping us again, alien sympathizer!" followed by Cade grabbing Verity by the hand telling her "come on kid we've got to get out of here, it's too dangerous!" as the two run through the streets as they try to dodge the fire as they are shot at by the Initiative soldiers only for the two vehicles to transform into their robot modes revealing them to be Autobots Hot Rod and Kup, with Kup cocking his shotgun while chomping his cy-gar saying "alright you troublemaking meatbags, let the kid live and nobody gets hurt". Bumblebee asks who the cranky old geezer-bot is, and Bulkhead tells Bumblebee "That's Sergeant Kup, he was commander of my old team the Wreckers back in the day, he led the team in many battles during the war on Cybertron, including the battle of Nebulos. he's a war hero, so show some respect" The Initiative soldiers deploy the drones from the trucks. Kup shoots the drones out of the sky with his shotgun while Hot Rod torches the trucks with his flamethrowers to prevent more drones from being deployed forcing the Initiative soldiers to retreat. Verity then runs up to Hot Rod and Kup to thank the two for saving her life, followed by Verity fist-bumping Hot Rod before she climbs onto Kup's shoulder. Bulkhead then salutes Kup, telling him "Sergeant Kup, Autobot Bulkhead of the Wreckers reporting for duty. It's an honor being in your presence sir". Kup then tells Bulkhead "My wrecker days are way behind me, kid. I'm old and retired, I relinquished command of the wreckers to Ultra Magnus before Cybertron fell. now I spend the rest of my days here looking after this little thing here (referring to Verity), so where are the other wreckers?". Bulkhead clenches his fist, saying "most of our brothers are dead, hunted down by the humans we once protected. after the team disbanded, I joined up with Optimus's crew" followed by Bulkhead introducing Kup to Bumblebee, Crosshairs, Drift, and the humans Cade, Lennox, Epps, and Santos. Bumblebee looks at Hot Rod, asking the red Autobot "so who are you?" followed by Hot Rod telling Bumblebee "name's Hot Rod, I used to be a member of the Autobot elite guard back on Cybertron, until I washed out". Bumblebee cocks his head, asking why he washed out. Kup elbows Hot Rod, saying "because this young 'bot here is a reckless hothead who doesn't know how to respect his elders" followed by Hot Rock saying "get off my back, old-timer". Kup then tells Hot Rod "If it wasn't for me keeping you out of trouble the Initiative would've killed you already!" followed by Verity telling the two 'bots to stop arguing. Verity then hops off Kup's shoulder and hugs Cade, thanking him for saving her from those guys, saying that they've been trying to kill her and her friends for a while. Lennox then grabs Verity's hand, telling her "don't worry, you'll be safe with us" and introduces her to Cade and the commandos. Verity looks up at Bumblebee, Crosshairs, Drift, and Bulkhead who all smile at her. the five Autobots then transform back into their vehicle modes along with Hot Rod and Kup with their human partners hopping inside before driving out of the city. We then cut to Optimus and the Dinobots arriving in Antarctica where they enter the wreckage of the Knightship, Grimlock crossing his arms asking Optimus why they came back here. Optimus tells Grimlock this is where he came into contact with the spirit of his past life the 13th prime and that he came here hoping he can reach out to him again and find out what the meaning behind the vision he had is. Optimus then enters the bridge and places his sword into the pedestal, followed by the spirit of the 13th prime appearing before Optimus, asking him what brings him back here. Optimus explains to the 13th prime that he had a vision of the prime and his knights fighting in an epic war of some kind and he wants to know what the meaning behind it is. The 13th prime tells Optimus that what he saw was a memory of his past life, one of his. The 13th prime's ghost then touches Optimus Prime's forehead followed by Prime waking up on a primordial landscape similar to the one in his vision, Optimus asking the 13th prime where they are. The 13th Prime tells Optimus that they are on Earth far, far into the past but more specifically one of his own memories. Optimus looks up to see a massive three-headed cybertronian dragon flying above his head: it's Predaking. We then see more and more of these robotic dragons fly in before landing on a cliffside, Optimus saying "what are those things?" The 13th prime tells him "Predacons, fearsome cybertronian beasts that attacked this planet eons ago". We then see the 13th Prime and the Knights of Cybertron arrive on the scene and charge at the Predacons slicing through the big metal dragons, followed by a shot of the 13th prime standing atop a pile of Predacon corpses holding an energon-soaked star saber. The 13th prime's ghost then tells Optimus "as the battle raged on for centuries, me and my knights were able to successfully wipe out the Predacons. But victory came at a heavy price, as my knights died in battle leaving me as the last knight, as without sacrifice there can be no victory". Optimus asks the 13th prime what the Predacons were doing on Earth, and the 13th prime tells Optimus that they were drawn to a rare energy source located on prehistoric Earth, the 13th prime's ghost showing Optimus into a cave filled with glowing purple crystals. Optimus tells the 13th prime that these look like Energon crystals, but nothing like the ones back on Cybertron which are blue while these ones are purple. The 13th prime tells Optimus that this is Dark Energon, the blood of Unicron, the chaos bringer. The Knights of Cybertron were left with no choice but to exterminate the Predacons in order to prevent them from potentially awakening Unicron which would spell doom for Cybertron. Optimus then wakes back up inside the ship, Grimlock asking Optimus what he saw. Optimus tells Grimlock that he saw the battle from his vision, the Knights of Cybertron's massacre of the Predacons, saying that he had no idea that the primes were willing to commit genocide in the name of Cybertron's future. Grimlock places his hand on Prime's shoulder and tells Optimus "knights did what had to be done, no sacrifice no victory". Optimus pulls the star saber out of its pedestal to look at the blade and says "the legacy of the primes is a complicated one. The Fallen, The caste system, and now this. the more I learn about our history, the more determined I am to atone for the sins of my predecessors". We then cut to the other Autobots driving through the Arizona desert until they come across an old abandoned N.E.S.T. outpost built into the side of a mountain. the seven Autobots all transform into their robot modes and enter the abandoned base, Lennox dusting off the old N.E.S.T. logo on the wall making him feel nostalgic for the good old days. Cade walks up to Lennox, asking him who the guy with the cowboy hat was saying that he overheard their conversation when they were all getting shot at by the Initiative. Lennox pulls out an old photo of himself and Dante during their days as cadets in the army and shows it to Cade, Lennox telling Cade that he and Abraham Dante go way back, saying that the two of them trained together as cadets, the two of them were like brothers. they fought many battles together, until 2007 when the Decepticons attacked. we get the scene from my rewrite of the 2007 movie where ravage kills the soldiers in the jungles of Vietnam but from Dante's perspective during his days as a soldier. Ravage bites off Dante's arm causing him to lay on the ground writhing in pain. Lennox and his commandos thought Dante died that day, but little did he and the others know that he secretly survived and formed the Initiative fueled by his hatred for transformers. Cade feels sorry for Lennox, saying he can't imagine how it must feel to be betrayed by someone he considered a brother. Bumblebee tells Cade that Optimus can, since Prime and Megatron also once considered each other brothers before they became mortal enemies. Hot Rod looks at Bumblebee, asking him "you know Optimus Prime?" Bumblebee tells Hot Rod "yeah, why do you ask?" followed by Hot Rod telling Bumblebee "Prime is my idol, that's why I enlisted in the Autobot elite guard so that I can follow in his footsteps and one day become a great prime just like him" followed by Kup crossing his arms and snarkily saying "like that's ever gonna happen". meanwhile Cade looks over at Verity and sees her tinkering with some pieces of machinery and walks over to the young girl to show her Sparkplug, telling her that he found this KSI camera drones busted-up and he rebuilt and reprogrammed it. Verity picks up Sparkplug and looks up to Cade, asking him "you like working with machines too?" followed by Cade telling her "of course I do, I'm an inventor" followed by Verity telling Cade "No way! I've always wanted to be an inventor when I grow up, my parents were scientists who worked for Kinetic Solutions Incorporated, I looked up to them. but then the Decepticons came and the invasion began, I got separated from my parents when they blew Mission City to hell. then the dust cleared, and I found their bodies among the rubble. I was four years old" Cade tells her "my wife died that same day, so I know exactly how you feel kid, losing someone you care about to an alien invasion. Y'know, you remind me a lot of my daughter when she was your age". Verity smiles, asking Cade "really? so where is your daughter now?" Cade then tells her "she's in College now. She graduated high school last year" Verity asks "do you miss her?" And cade tells her "yes. ever since she left I can't stop worrying about her". Verity looks up at Bumblebee, asking him "what about you, did you lose someone you love?" Bumblebee tells her "I did, her name was Arcee. I lost her 10 years ago when me and the others were being hunted by Cemetery Wind. for the past decade I never stopped looking for her, hoping that there was a chance she was still alive. but I've come to accept that she's probably gone". Verity tells Bumblebee "I'm Sorry". Kup sits in the corner chomping his cy-gar telling Verity "alright, sun's getting real low. come on kid, best you go get some rest". followed by Verity putting Sparkplug in her backpack and begrudgingly going to sleep inside her makeshift hammock. Cade looks up out the window into the night sky as we transition into a shot of space where we see Megatron flying Lockdown's ship the Death's Head down to the surface of the desolate planet of Char home to the intergalactic prison known as the Garrus-9 penitentiary, home to the Galaxy's worst of the worst. Megatron exits the ship and storms the premises, two security robots pointing their guns at Megatron telling him "stop! who goes there? what do you want?" Followed by Megatron saying "I want my crew" before blasting the heads off of the security bots with his fusion cannon before storming the prison walking past various alien prisoners before he comes across a set of six prison cells containing some Deception prisoners including Lugnut, Blitzwing, Strika, Berserker, Knockout, and Sideways. Megatron blows the doors off their prison cells with his fusion cannon and tells them to come with him, saying that he needs their help to capture Optimus Prime. Knock out crosses his arms, asking Megatron "so what's in it for us?" only for Lugnut to snap at the vain Decepticon medic, telling him "do not question the Authority of our glorious leader!" followed by Strika saying "I agree, besides it beats rotting in a prison cell for the rest of our existence". the seven Decepticons board the Death's Head and leave Char, Megatron setting a course for Earth.