« The Transformers: Regeneration One #89 »
"Natural Selection, Part Four"
Publisher	IDW Publishing
First published	March 13,2013
Cover date	March 2013
Writer	Simon Furman
Penciler	Andrew Wildman
Inker	Stephen Baskerville
Colorist	John-Paul Bove
Letterer	Chris Mowry
Editor	John Barber
Continuity	Marvel Comics continuity

Grimlock and the Dinobots clash, and Hot Rod is presented with a choice of divine import.

Synopsis

Hunted by theDecepticons and theGene Key-modifiedAutobots alike,Snarl,Swoop andSludge withdraw to the bowels ofIacon to evade their pursuers. Figuring that they can't hold out for long against a whole planet, theDinobots elect to put their own house in order before they go out by forcing a confrontation withGrimlock. The trio proceed to strike at theNursery in order to draw their former leader to them; their intrusion is detected at the Civil Defense Hub, but, recognizing it as a summons from his Dinobots, Grimlock takes out the on-duty officerTreadshot before he can send in any troops.

At theSonic Canyons,Scorponok supervisesPerceptor and his crew as they draw near to completing construction on his massive Gene Key, pontificating about his plan to heal the rift inPrimus's grand plan that came about as the result of the Transformers' civil war, thus ensuring his place in history as an architect of peace. Perceptor opines that with chaos being the natural order of things, perhaps the war ispart of Primus's plan, causing a sudden swell of rage in Scorponok that he fights to suppress, insisting to himself that he has evolved beyond being a creature of aggression.

Wheels continue to turn back onEarth:Optimus Prime makes his way to the crashedArk, intending to remove its threat from the planet, though unable to decide whether it is altruism or atonement that motivates him. Little does Prime realize thatGalvatron has already seized the Ark, and is preparing it for lift off. As he does so, the inactiveShockwave, who wired his damaged body into the ship's systems following its crash in order to save his own life, lifts his head...

In the depths ofCybertron,Hot Rod senses that he is intended to choose between the two items he has found in a secret chamber: theSword of Primus, with which he can use to fight the encroachingDemons, or theCovenant of Primus, bearing knowledge. Deciding that what he requires are answers, Hot Rod grasps the disc and is shown a vision of primordial Cybertron, as the Demons—Primus's first creations—rise from the planet and worship around a stone effigy of their maker. Time spins on and Hot Rod sees free will take root among the Demons, who turn upon one another, prompting Primus to wipe his experiment clean, sundering the planet's surface and destroying his creations. Realizing that some Demons survived the purge within the planet and that Primus intends for him to finish the job, Hot Rod takes up the sword and turns for battle.

Grimlock arrives at the Nursery and calls out for the Dinobots, explaining that he has found a cure forNucleon. The Dinobots emerge and attack him, accusing him of going too far, and Grimlock is reluctant to fight back, having risked so much to save them. Faced with the end at their hands, however, he refuses to lie down and die and transforms to fight back... at which point Scorponok's troops arrive, having followed Grimlock via a homing device Scorponok had placed in his new body. Rather than them fight directly, Grimlock orders the Dinobots to take cover and shoots open the containment capsule holdingInferno, whose uncontrollable Nucleon-induced internal combustion ability causes a massive fiery explosion that takes Scorponok's men out. The Dinobots emerge from the smoldering Nursery to be met byGrapple,Crosshairs,Blurr andHosehead, drawn there by the enemy comm-line chatter about taking down Grimlock. While Hosehead goes to try and contain Inferno's heat issues, Crosshairs and Grimlock agree to coordinate an attack between their groups to take Scorponok down and reverse the Gene Key's effects.

In the skies over Cybertron, the Autobot shipValiant emerges from hyperspace, returning from Earth with casualties of the recent conflict there. Unsure of what to do,Pounce andWingspan contact Scorponok, who instructs them to provide theValiant with a landing flight plan... and then use the planet's defenses to blow the ship out of the sky!

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Quotes

"Take down Scorponok and use Gene Key to put things straight. Most of us die in process, naturally."
"Naturally."

—Grimlock andCrosshairs are pretty genre-savvy.

"They are theenemy, thehunted, thedead walking!"
"Who?"
"Us?"

—Snarl andSwoop realise thatHighbrow is talking about the Dinobots.

"Dinobots are public enemy number one."
"Again"

—Snarl andSludge on their infamy.

Notes

Artwork and technical errors

• It's barely worth pointing out something like this at this stage in the proceedings, but Sideswipe's head is laughably off-model. Additionally, he's got red thighs and a black midriff, which both ought to be white; his shoulders and biceps are also coloured entirely red when they're normally black and white, respectively, but that's done in accordance with the colors of hisUniversecharacter model.

• Pounce (at the console) and Wingspan (standing) appear withdifferent body and helmet designs, whichutterly misses the point of their beingclones. Apparently, Pounce has been drawn with a more toyetic head, with individual eyes, while Wingspan's is based more on the clones' character models, which gave them goggles. Normally indistinguishable (being clones), they're individually identifiable because Wingspan has been drawn with a very toyetic flip-down neck panel.
• "Aggression" is misspelled as "agression" on page 6 when Scorponok is talking to Perceptor.

Continuity errors

• Despite being shot in the face and left for dead two issues ago, Slapdash is shown on search patrol.

Continuity notes

• Hot Rod had a vision of confronting a Demon with a sword back inissue #84.

Real-life references

• Hot Rod's choice seems to be deliberately paralleling the origin ofMarvel Comics superheroCaptain Britain, in which young Brian Braddock is offered a choice by divine powers between a sword and another artifact (an amulet in Brian's case, the covenant in Hot Rod's) representing violence and non-violence, respectively. Both Braddock and Hot Rod choose the non-violent option; for Braddock, this marked him as worthy to become a super-hero. Whatever could that mean for Hot Rod?

Other trivia

Transformers references

• The disk found by Hot Rod last issue is here identified as theCovenant of Primus fromBeast Wars (where one of its two appearances took place inan episode that Furman himself wrote). Rather than a book, as it appeared there, the covenant is reimagined as a Golden Disk, a famous method of information storage also introduced inBeast Wars,many of which have subsequently appeared in Transformers lore.
• TheValiant was previously used as the name of an Autobot ship in theFun PublicationsCybertron story "Force of Habit".

Furminated

• Treadshot gets his head bashed into a console by Grimlock; it doesn't look especially fatal, but he doesn't appear again in the series.

Covers (3)

• Cover A: Shockwave's memories, by Andrew Wildman andJason Cardy.
• Cover B: Hot Rod's choice, byGuido Guidi.
• Cover RI: Inferno heat-blasts Brainstorm, Darkwing and Dreadwind, byGeoff Senior andJosh Burcham.

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External links

• Simon Furman's Script (W)rap
• Simon Furman Q&A