September tenth was destined to be a date etched permanently into the annals of history.
In the small hours of that morning, under the personal command of Megatron, a force of no fewer than thirty Decepticons launched a devastating assault on Yunu, the capital city of Egypt.
Cybertronian jets shrieked across the skyline in waves, shattering the sleep of millions. The wail of air-defense sirens marked the opening chords of the city's ruin.
Whoosh— Boom!
Before the air-defense networks scattered across the metropolitan area could even calculate intercept vectors, the entire capital was transformed into a sea of fire.
"Bathe in the slaughter, Decepticons!" Megatron roared, standing upon the apex of Yunu's landmark structure, the nearly two-hundred-meter-tall Yunu Tower.
The act of violence satisfied every bloodthirsty instinct inherent to the Decepticon coding, allowing them to exert two hundred percent of their combat efficacy. For hours, the thunder of explosions and the screams of the dying filled the air. It wasn't until dawn broke that the Decepticons finally began to withdraw, leaving behind a ruined expanse where few structures remained whole.
It wasn't as though Egypt hadn't attempted to resist. But if the Decepticons could comfortably handle the military forces of Earth's absolute strongest superpowers, the local military didn't stand a chance. By the time the raid concluded, the Egyptian Air Force had been entirely wiped out—though, truth be told, they hadn't possessed many fighter jets to begin with.
The news of the slaughter spread across the globe within half a day, deliberately amplified by certain interested parties. The world was thrown into an absolute uproar; every human now realized the paradigm had shifted.
This was no longer a vague threat. It was an ultimatum.
The monstrous alien invaders weren't playing a game of bluff; they were fully prepared to wage a war of extinction. Those who had previously assumed the alien threat was all bark and no bite found their voices caught in their throats, silenced instantly. The commentators who had loudly championed the immediate annihilation of the alien robots suddenly retreated into their shells, hiding like cowards.
It was easy to point a gun at an alien when one assumed it was bound by human notions of morality; it was an entirely different matter when the alien proved it would gladly flatten a capital city without blinking.
Egypt, Galamy.
A convoy led by the yellow Camaro tore down a northern highway, kicking up a massive plume of desert dust. Inside the car, the expressions of Sam, Simmons, and the others were incredibly grim.
They had set out on their quest for the Matrix of Leadership immediately after parting ways with Jetfire, but their journey had barely begun when the worst possible news reached them.
"The Decepticons hit the capital. They're trying to smoke you out, kid," Simmons said, his voice heavy as he set down a satellite phone. He had maintained a few deep-cover informants within the intelligence agencies from his days running Sector 7, and he had just received confirmation of Yunu's destruction.
In reality, the news was already plastered across every broadcast medium on earth. Egypt had no intention of keeping it a secret; if the aliens were going to ruin their house, they were damn well going to ensure the rest of the world felt the heat too.
"We have to move faster," Sam said, slapping his cheeks with both hands to force his mind into focus. He felt a crushing weight of grief and self-reproach, but the urgency overrode his despair. Having witnessed the death of Optimus Prime, he had grown past the stage of uselessly lamenting his circumstances.
"Good lad. I'm glad to see you aren't falling apart," Simmons said, unrolling a tactical map. He pointed to a narrow, dagger-shaped gulf at the northernmost tip of the Red Sea. "My contact dug through the archives. The ancient Sumerians referred to a place called Aqaba as the 'Tip of the Dagger.' It sits right at the terminus of the Gulf of Aqaba."
"According to ancient legend, the gulf was a blade that struck the earth, dividing the land. Then came the modern era, and they dug the canal, splitting the west from the east entirely. So Aqaba is our highest-probability site."
"So Aqaba is where the entrance is?" Sam asked, tapping the brakes slightly as a military checkpoint loomed ahead. They were officially leaving the Galamy sector.
"Oh man, what do we do? I am not going to an Egyptian prison!" Leo panicked from the back seat, poking his head forward. "And look at those two cars behind us—they don't even have drivers!"
"Keep your head down, I've got this," Simmons grumbled, swallowing hard. Internally, his spark was pounding just as fast; if their cover blew here, the mission was over before it began. Yet, he forced his posture into an air of casual authority.
"Identification papers! Let's see them, quickly!" a weathered female officer in a beret barked from a wooden guard tower. Seeing no movement from the three foreign vehicles, she marched down the steps with an irritated stride.
"Shit!" Sam gasped suddenly, ducking his face and pointing toward the upper framework of the tower. "Look up there—they've got a camera!"
It was absurd to see a high-grade, real-time surveillance feed mounted onto a crude wooden watchtower, but the primitive exterior was a trap. Though Sam tried to shield his face, he was a fraction of a second too late.
Deep beneath the ruined streets of Yunu, inside a military monitoring cell equipped with an isolated terminal, a high-resolution snapshot flickered onto a screen. A soldier in uniform studied the image carefully before lifting a secure handset and dialing a dedicated frequency.
"Report. The Witwicky boy has been sighted."
"Alright, relax, everyone..." Simmons muttered under his breath, smoothing his jacket. "Act like we're out for a Sunday drive. Don't look like spies."
"You?" Wheelie popped his head out of Mikaela's arms, squinting at the approaching officer. "She's short. Tell her she looks tall, she'll let us go. Short people love that kind of crap."
The officer stopped by the Camaro's window, staring directly at Simmons in the passenger seat. "Where are you coming from?"
Simmons deliberately misheard the question. "We're heading to the Tip of the Dagger—Aqaba. You know it? We're going up there." Seeing the officer's suspicious stare, he gestured to Sam. "This is my family. My son." Then he pointed to Leo and Mikaela. "My youngest boy, and my daughter."
Leo and Mikaela offered a pair of strained, awkward smiles.
"We're just a family on holiday, all the way from New York."
"New York?" The officer's eyes widened instantly at the mention of the city, her stern expression melting into one of genuine warmth. "You are from New York?"
"Yes, ma'am, born and raised..."
"Let them through," she turned and waved to the guards, signaling them to move the wooden barricades. She turned back to Simmons with a sigh. "I love that city. It is the dream of my life to move there one day."
"Oh, and by the way, Aqaba is only fifty kilometers ahead. Keep heading straight north and you cannot miss it."
"Thank you, officer," Simmons replied smoothly. "If we ever cross paths again, the sandwiches are on me."
The officer offered a crisp salute. "Safe travels!"
"I can't believe that actually worked. We're clean?" Leo collapsed against the rear cushion, letting out a breath he felt he'd been holding for miles once the checkpoint faded from the mirrors.
"Naturally," Simmons wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead. "Told you I had it under control."
Sam reached out and tapped the Camaro's console. "What are the exact coordinates, Simmons? For Aqaba."
"Let me check..." Simmons pulled out his navigation array. For a man who had been dragged out of retirement, his technical preparation was meticulous. "29.5 degrees North, 35 degrees East."
"Perfect. Bumblebee, floor it."
The Camaro's engine roared in acknowledgement.
Aqaba was a thriving hub, easily ranking among the most significant cities in the region. Due to its position along the gulf and its proximity to the canal shipping lanes—allowing it to collect port fees until its coffers overflowed—the metropolitan area boasted a permanent population exceeding five million people.
The fifty-kilometer distance was a patchwork of poorly maintained infrastructure, but with Bumblebee running at peak performance, the group covered the distance in under twenty minutes.
"Let's review the riddle," Simmons said, stepping out of the car and looking across the sprawling architecture of the coastal city. "'When the morning light shines on the Tip of the Dagger, three kings shall open the entrance.'"
"We've already established the identity of the three kings. That would be me..." Simmons's finger skipped over Leo entirely, landing on Sam and Mikaela. "...and you two."
"Hey! What about me?" Leo protested. "Why can't it be the three of us? Or better yet, Bumblebee and the twins? We're looking for alien scrap; it makes way more sense for the three kings to be the giant robots."
"Hmm... that's actually a logically sound point," Simmons agreed with a slight nod, before offering a smug grin. "But you don't get a vote."
"Alright, people. The only missing variable is the 'morning light.'" Simmons pulled his notebook out again. "I take it literally: the Sun. When dawn breaks, the very first structure in Aqaba to be touched by the sun's rays—that's where the tomb of the Primes is buried."
"Are you serious?" Mikaela looked across the massive city skyline. "Look at the size of this place. How are we supposed to figure out which specific stone gets hit by the sun first?"
Simmons scratched his head, his confidence wavering slightly. "Well... our options are limited. We wait here until dawn, and we watch the sunrise. How's that sound?"
Sam and Mikaela shared a look before Sam nodded heavily. "We don't have a choice. We wait."
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