Darctavious Prime awakened fully within the heart of Cybertron.
Not in darkness but in communion.
The core around him shifted, alloy and energy parting as if in reverence. Time slowed until even the planet's rotation became perceptible, each moment stretching long enough for thought to become certainty.
Then Primus spoke.
Not in words.
In truth.
You are my answer to extinction.
You will preserve what cannot survive this war.
You will endure where others will burn.
Knowledge unfolded.
The coming schism. Megatron's fall. Optimus's rise. Cybertron drained to a husk.
And beyond all of it
Unicron.
Darctavious saw him.
A god of entropy drifting between realities, bound in cycles of hunger and awakening. He was shown Unicron's current location far beyond mapped space, dormant yet stirring and the truth few Primes had ever known: Unicron was not merely Cybertron's enemy.
He was its shadow.
Other secrets followed.
Ancient fail safes. Forbidden technologies. Seeds meant not for conquest but for rebirth.
When the communion ended, Darctavious rose.
The core parted completely as he ascended, emerging into the sacred chamber that housed the AllSpark.
He stopped.
Even with all his knowledge, the sight stole a fraction of processing cycles.
The AllSpark was colossal a radiant cube of living divinity, its light casting impossible shadows across the chamber walls. Every Cybertronian spark that had ever existed echoed faintly within it.
Creation. Memory. Hope.
Darctavious stepped forward and placed both hands upon its surface.
The chamber trembled.
Using the protocols Primus had etched into his spark, Darctavious began to draw, not greedily, not violently but with precision. Power flowed into him, compressed and cataloged, stored within pocketed folds of space-time anchored to his own spark.
Not theft.
Investment.
This energy would give rise to a new lineage.
The Preservartrons.
Cybertronians born not for endless war but for survival, adaptation, and continuity.
When the process ended, the AllSpark's glow dimmed only slightly, but noticeably.
Darctavious stepped back.
I will restore what I have taken, he vowed silently.
Then he turned away.