The Train Wars: The Origin

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"The Train Wars: The Origin" 電車大戦 —起点— (Densha Taisen —Kiten—)
Publisher	Hero-X
Published in	Transformers Generations 2022
First published	July 27, 2022
Story & art by	Yuki Ohshima
Continuity	Japanese Generation 1 cartoon continuity
Chronology	2010?

The newly born Trainbots must contend with their creator's errant children.

Synopsis

Back when Shouki was manufactured, he was "Mach"...

At Doctor Fujiyama's lab (provided by Shibuya Electronic), he and Atari Hitotonari watch as "Development Code Mach" is rebooted. Later, Mach is with his brothers Night and Snow, in preparation for testing together. Fujiyama is a bit tired of Mach's overly eager attitude, so he assigns babysitting duties to Hitotonari. Before his regular energon cube feeding, Mach asks Hitotonari... why was he made? What is his true purpose in life? Hitotonari, having went through similar questions herself, advises the Trainbot that he should think about it, and make his own choices for himself.

Elsewhere in the lab, Nightbird has broken out thanks to her evil AI "brother", Shadow. The two exploit the lab's resources, upgrading the ninja robot's chassis. The two make their big entrance in front of the three finalized Trainbots and the two humans, but Mach transforms to save his creators from harm, having made his own choice to protect others. Nightbird rushes deeper into the lab, so Fujiyama commands all mobile Trainbots to take her in, unharmed.

Elsewhere, Nightbird finds the three still inactivated Trainbots that Shadow proposes converting into her "vassals". They're interrupted when Yellow and her team of prototype Trainbots confront the ninja. Nightbird attempts an escape, so Yellow has her team combine into G Liner to easily subdue their "sister". Unfortunately, as Shadow points out, the prototype combiner is a bit slow on the draw, so the swift Nightbird manages to install Shadow's cerebro-shell program into G Liner. Under the two's control, G Liner absconds with the three sleeping Trainbots, leading to the remaining three panicking on what to do. Mach takes charge and is deemed the leader; he proposes a risky idea of literally charging into the combiner in a doubleheader configuration with himself and Snow, with Night holding up the track.

After the tactic succeeds at stopping Nightbird and G Liner, Autobot reinforcements help with the clean up while Yellow angrily chews out her younger brothers for such a dangerous maneuver. (Hitotonari, on the other hand, is happy that Mach is closer to discovering what he wants to live for.) Fujiyama is exasperated at his creations fighting, but is grateful that his precious Nightbird is back to him safe and sound... only to see that she's escaped and left Night unconscious!

Perched above the city, Nightbird ponders her next move as Shadow asks if she's lonely, even with her brother's company.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Notes

Continuity notes

• This story gives the nitty-gritty on the Trainbots' long-established back story of being human-made Transformers manufactured in Japan. Their creator is established as Doctor Fujiyama, creator of Nightbird from "Enter the Nightbird". His assistant is Atari Hitotonari, the perpetually unlucky Kiss Player from Yuki Ohshima's major Transformers work, Kiss Players. She would later appear in Legends and Generations Selects, both set after this story.
• A half-obscured sign on the outside of the train yard reads "谷電気". This is a fragment of "Shibuya Electric" (渋谷電気), full name Shibuya Electric Manufacturing Corporation (渋谷電気工業製作所),^[1] the manufacturer of the Trainbots as per the bio of Shouki's mail-away exclusive Generations toy that was the impetus for the original "Train Wars" in 2014. They appear to be bankrolling Fujiyama and Hitonari's research in this story.
• In what may or may not be a happy accident, Fujiyama's employ with Shibuya as a part of the Trainbots' construction dovetails with the accounting of the Trainbots' origin by frequent Transformers contributor Hirofumi Ichikawa for Fun Publications' English-language social media feature Ask Vector Prime in 2015.
• Nightbird being accompanied by an AI named "Shadow" was established in the prose included with her Masterpiece toy. This story explains how she acquired her new form, based on the Legends toy, which she would use in the chronologically later Legends comic.
• In Shadow's bag of tricks is a "cerebro-shell program". Cerebro-shells were originally the domain of the Insecticon Bombshell, who also used them to brainwash unsuspecting victims to his will.

Transformers references

• The Trainbots' development codes are based on their preliminary names from production of The Headmasters anime series. They, in turn, were based on how the Diaclone Train Robo (whose molds were used for the Trainbots) were sometimes identified as "Machliner", et al.
• The prototype Trainbots established here are based on the second set of Train Robo decoes from Diaclone. Like their younger "brothers", their development codes are based on Diaclone identifications in the vein "Yellowliner".
• Yellow makes a line referring to herself as "a doctor". It comes from the Doctor Yellow trains used to analyze track condition and status (and which the original Train Robo was based on).
• The prototype combiner is "G Liner", based on Raiden's own preliminary name of "Grandliner".
• The prototype Trainbots declare G Liner "Doubleheader Combination!" (重連合体 jūren gattai) as they combine. This is a reference to Raiden's function from his original bio, "Doubleheader Combiner Warrior," itself a reference to the double heading, the railway practice of using two engines to pull a single train together. Though, Raiden and G Liner, being six locomotives in a row, aren't really heading, let alone double heading (Sextuple heading?), anything, since they never actually pull any train behind them.

Trivia

• G Liner's name is actually never outright said in the story, instead being conveyed through binary code as the combiner is taken over by the cerebro-shell program.

References

• Translation of "The Train Wars: The Origin"
• Lettering of the translation by MrRald

Footnotes