Thirty stellar cycles after the end of the "Beast Wars," it's business as usual on the planet of Cybertron. Like on most days, a shipment of unrefined energon from a far-off asteroid colony is delivered to the refinery in Silicon City. However, as Maximal Lieutenant Pantora discovers from a mysterious Predacon informant, that shipment may end up containing more than meets the eye. Curiosity overwhelms her, and with the dubious help of Snitch the fly, she breaks into the plant. The intrepid pair is discovered by the plant's security force, but not before locating a mysterious box among the daily shipment, a box which appears to contain an ancient Autobot computer. The plant's owner, Thundershot, is called in to inspect the damage. Wondering as to the computer's purpose, he activates it. It seems that this isn't just an Autobot computer, this is a twenty-foot-tall Autobot-computer. In the ensuing chaos, the Predacon escapes, reactivating the plant's autoguns, which take aim at the Autobot as well. He manages to dispatch them without too much trouble; Thundershot panics, his sonic weaponry doing more damage to his plant than the Pred. Eventually, our heroes receive an important call from the Church of Primus in the center of the city. The priestess there, Lightbreeze the dove, was planning on caring for the Autobot herself. Given that the Autobot can transform into an ordinary-sized laptop, Thundershot and Pantora have little problem getting him across the grid. The discussion with Lightbreeze is enlightening: the Autobot's name is Eldred Cyrix, and he has little memory of anything save a beautiful Cybertronian Golden Age and a lost lab assistant named Evalina. While the priestess's Predacon-turned-Maximal assistant, Mantisoar, leads the Autobot back to the church's own computer facilities, there is another interruption. The higher-ups of the Maximal Air Command have orders to locate the Autobot for the Maximal government so he can be questioned and registered a citizen. Sensing trouble, the Maximals in the church hold the Air Command off as long as possible, buying enough time for Mantisoar to sneak Eldred into the jamming zone in the grid below.