Chapter Text
Amidst the glow of flickering screens and scattered datapads, Orion Pax was but an interesting figure, lost in the labyrinth of his own solitude. He was your typical university student who's faceplate is always buried in datapads after datapads, all day long. The epitome of a university hermit. His family tree resembled a barren wasteland, and his social life? Well, let's just say it made a hermit crab look like a party animal.
He didn't have anyone aside for himself, he grew up with no sire nor carrier and he was just alone in life. He took odd jobs here and there to help him live and see another cycle. With no sire nor carrier to guide him, he wandered the corridors of life all by himself. Despite such depressing situation, he always find solace on the novels he has accumulated throughout the years one of which was his all time favorite, it was a story lace with tragedy of a fallen ruler who governed his kingdom with an iron fist, who used to carry the same name as he currently bore— a cruel irony he often found comfort in. He loved the story despite it's tragic and bittersweet end. It was the very first novel he had brought when his first paycheck arrived after grolling hours of being in one of his very odd jobs —the kind that left you questioning your life choices.
But fate, seem to have a twisted sense of humor. For on that fateful day, Orion Pax awoke, blinking groggily, he rubbed his optics, half-expecting to find himself back in his dorm room, tangled in his recharge cables. But as he looked around, he realized that this was in fact not his dorm– he was in a lavish chamber, surrounded by opulent furnishings.
Orion found himself thrust into a world akin to his own yet so different, his once slender frame now bulked with power and authority. It screams control and domination compare to his other one which if altered to the side, he could be considered a femme. Panic seized him, his mind reeling with disbelief as he stumbled out of the birth he layed.
Orion Pax is known to be very calm and can work well being under pressure although at that current moment— he momentarily lost this capability. He tried to pinch himself,hoping for a quick exit from this absurdity. Spoiler alert: it didn't work.
So he tried going back to sleep in hopes he'll be back on his own birth. But reality remained stubbornly unchanged, leaving him to grapple with the absurdity of his situation. He was a mess, a bulky mech, running around in a very grandure birthroom with a balcony that oversees the cities and towers of home world. It was when he found information of himself did he understood what is happening.
The realization hit him like a metro train on the way to kaon when he gaze stumbled upon his reflection, the truth crashed over him like a tidal wave, washing away any semblance of rationality. It was like staring into the punchline of a cosmic joke.
He was no longer Orion Pax, the university mecha with crippling student debt, but Optimus Prime, a symbol of tyranny and oppression, destined to meet a fate as tragic as the tales he once cherished. He was now the very being that was describe as one of Primus chosen youngs and the very mech who was bound to fall of the hands of the Lord high protector.
And in that moment of revelation, a realization dawned upon him - If he wasn't too busy having an existential crisis, he might've laughed at the sheer absurdity of it all.
"Oh no no no no, this is bad.... This is horrible!" He cried, holding onto his helm as he stares at his reflection once more, the optics of a dictator stared back at his confused yet petrified state. His servos reaches his faceplate, pinching his cheeks once again as hard as he can only to let out a pained noise.
With his optics wide in disbelief, Orions mind raced through the many endless possibilities of how he could have ended up in such a ludicrous situation. "I'm slagged..." he muttered, feeling the weight of the universe's cosmic joke pressing down on his shoulders like a pile of bricks he once threw at his colleague that one time, a story for another day.
"First, I'm battling university depts to the best of my ability, and the next thing I know, I'm ruling over Cybertron like some malfunctioning despot!?" he ranted to himself, pacing back and forth in his chambers, his servo gesturing wildly as if trying to grasp onto some semblance of sanity. "Maybe I accidentally stepped into a warp field and got zapped into an alternate reality? Or perhaps some mecha spiked my energon with some sort of glitch-inducing concoction?" he pondered aloud, his processor whirring with absurd theories. "But that can't be right.... I remember going to my birth and closing my optics!" Perhaps he had been caught in some experimental virtual reality simulation? Or had he simply ingested one too many high-grade energon drinks at the cafe last night?
No matter how hard he tried to rationalize it, the fact remained – he was stuck in a world where he's playing the role of a tyrant who will end up dead. He stared at his reflection for probably the third time, he couldn't help but let out a weary chuckle. "Well, at least somebody would get a kick out of this...probably someone who has a glitch in their processor " he muttered, resigning himself to the absurdity of it all.
With a shake of his helm, Orion Pax squared his shoulders and sighed heavily, he's determined to find a way out of this mess – preferably before he accidentally decreed that all Cybotronian must wear pink paint jobs or something equally ridiculous. After all, ruling over Cybertron and surving as a tyrant is one thing, but ruling over it without a sense of humor? Now that's challenging. Besides, comedy—at this point— is a must, especially when life itself insists on being the ultimate cosmic prankster.
But also probably because he doesn't wanna die like the big guy.