Transformers - Son of Primus

Prologue: A Need for Speed

Stripes, a white and blue BMW M3 GTR, pondered over his new-found existence as a Cybertronian. He didn't want this. He didn't want to get dragged into a million-year-old war for power. He didn't want any of it. He couldn't have any of it on his hands. There he stood, on the edge of a large plateau, overlooking Carbon Canyon, tears of Energon running down his faceplate. He wept for what he had lost, what he could not go back to...

"Damn you, Galvatron... Damn you..." He sobbed, clutching the area of his chest where he had mangled the Decepticon insignia they had inscribed on him. His tears did not cease to flow. He had barely escaped the abuse and clutches of the Decepticons, the badge they had imprinted on his chest etched, scratched, and worn beyond recognition. He was not going to be part of their conflict. He was no one's pawn. His hand servo clenched into a fist of rage as sadness and despair coursed through his circuits, the feeling going into his very spark. He heard car engines revving through the canyon, seeing the headlights of various models drifting through the corners and hairpins on the road. Street racers. They were always challenging each other in the canyon. Contests of skill. He remembered when he was one of them. When he was human...

How Stripes longed for his lost humanity. Granted, he didn't have much of a life as a human street racer. But it was much more than he had now. Back then, he had some acquaintances, a girlfriend he was planning to marry, a crew, a home, even some money. Now, that was all gone. The Decepticons had taken everything from him... Stripes missed all of his human friends, acquaintances: Nikki, Neville, Samuel... He even missed some of his rivals, and Cross! Cross, of all people!

It had been several months since his change to a Cybertronian. Many more months since his last meet up with his old crew in Palmont. Code name: Stickshift. He wondered how they were all doing. His human picture was all over the news: everyone was looking for him since his last encounter with the law. It wasn't pretty. He had to outmaneuver undercover cops in that one. Street racing units. That was when he encountered Galvatron and his faction.

Stripes remembered what happened: Galvatron was charging at him in vehicle mode. His human self was forced to turn the car into an unrecoverable drift, and it rolled the car. Shortly afterward, Galvatron grabbed him straight out of his own car, the roof was torn off after Galvatron had scanned it. They somehow had knocked him out. Either that or the accident injured him enough that he lost consciousness. The next thing Stripes knew, he woke up like this: A freak of science and nature.

The Decepticons beat him, tried to break him many times over, but Stripes kept his patience as best he could. He waited for an opportunity to escape and found it. Several weeks ago, he had finally found his way back to Palmont, only to find they had officially declared him dead. He had driven by his grave; A simple headstone decorated with a big block engine engraving, the name reading clear in the stone his human name: Carlos Lopez.

He turned his radio to a station he usually listened to when he drove. It was playing a song by Linkin Park he recognized: Castle of Glass. At first, it only seemed to deepen his sorrow. But then, he saw a light. A light within his soul, his very being.

"Galvatron..." He whispered. "You took everything from me. But I won't let you control me, as my friends are with me, now and forever. No longer will I be afraid. Somehow, I will find strength, find guidance. Those you send after me will be ashamed, and disgraced. I will not let what you did to me mold me into what you wanted me to become. I will not give up... I will triumph, and when I'm done... you will regret everything you've done. Not just to me, but everyone else you've hurt!"