Ark (WFC)

The Ark is an Autobot starship from the War for Cybertron portion of the Aligned continuity family.

Burning out its fuse up here, alone.

The Ark, aka Project Generation One, was the city-sized ship that the Autobots left Cybertron on during the Great Exodus. Unlike other galactic transports, the Ark was extremely large, and had other special modifications made by Optimus Prime, such as its gold color, as other transports were gray.

Fiction

Aligned novels

When Optimus Prime removed the Plasma Energy Chamber poisoning Cybertron's core with Dark Energon, it informed him that while healing, the planet could not sustain a fraction of the life it currently did, and the Autobots needed to leave. Optimus announced Project Generation One to his comrades, many of whom deemed the notion suicidal as the Cybertronians had not left the planet since the Golden Age. Regardless, Jazz said he would rather die on a starship than on a planet, and declared "Let's build this Ark."

Alpha Trion oversaw the Ark's construction in the Well of All Sparks, installing Teletraan-1 inside, while Optimus drew out and crashed Trypticon aboard the Eight Track. When they returned, the Ark was completed and they boarded the ship. Sideswipe was appointed the pilot. Alpha Trion refused a place, aware Vector Sigma would keep him alive, while Omega Supreme, Jetfire, Ultra Magnus, Springer and the Wreckers sacrificed a chance to leave, giving time for the Ark to launch by keeping Trypticon at bay.

However, Trypticon transformed into the Nemesis and pursued the Ark into the last space bridge, but when it emerged, the Decepticons were nowhere to be found. The Ark was outside an unknown spiral galaxy where the AllSpark was detected. Bumblebee asked Optimus if they knew the way home: he replied the Matrix of Leadership would guide them back one day. Exodus

The Ark emerged from the defunct space bridge without any major visible casualties. Its archives were checked for any maps or direction its passengers might use, until it was discovered that they had neared a long lost colony of Cybertronians on a planet known as Velocitron. The Ark was later brought onto the surface of the speed-centred planet and was being repaired until an explosion that took place a certain distance from its hull led Optimus Prime to believe that the Ark's age — it being described as an 'ancient machine' — and its suffering of a space bridge malfunction might have been the cause of some internal failure that led to the explosion. He was later informed by Silverbolt that the explosion was the result of sabotage and Optimus suspected they had a traitor on board. Much later when the Ark was parked low in Junkion's orbit and Optimus was coming to terms with the Junkion leader Wreck-Gar, the ship suddenly plummeted toward the surface of the junk planetoid, embedding itself in the ground, and causing a ripple of shock to sweep over the planet. Later Optimus was told by Velocitronian passengers Clocker and Mainspring that they had checked the Ark over before the incident, and they had done so with focus on the ship's fuel reservoir, and that everything had been safe, save for the tiny rupture in it. That they said was not enough to cause the Ark's fall. Once again the accident was revealed to be the result of sabotage, thus deepening Optimus' suspicion of a traitor in their midst. Still later when Junkion was falling apart as a result of the extraction of the Requiem Blaster from the planetoid's core, the Ark had to take off minus some of its intended repairs, with additional damage taken from the Seekers' missiles. It was then ordered to turn back toward the remains of Junkion as part of a newly fabricated plan that Optimus engineered in order to play upon Megatron's desire to kill and so contain the Decepticon threat for a while. As it was doing so it had some trouble resisting the gravitational pull of the Requiem Blaster grafted onto the Nemesis. When Megatron discovered the direction in which the AllSpark was to be found, the Ark was made to pursue the Nemesis, without two of its passengers, Clocker and Mainspring, who left with the other components of Nexus Prime. The Ark also had the Star Seekers' ship, the Tidal Wave, in pursuit of it. Exiles

As the Ark sailed through space, it detected Aquatron on its long range scans, finding the planet to be rich in energon. Sliding into orbit of the mechanical planet, the Ark dispatched shuttles to the surface to make contact with the natives. As the command staff mingled on the surface, the Ark remained in orbit, being snared by a tractor beam from the Nemesis when the Decepticon ship caught up with them. The Ark unleashed Superion to defend itself only for both ships to be immobilized by a beam from the surface. With both sides on the surface, it was found that Aquatron had been conquered by the Quintessons. Monitoring from orbit, the Ark picked up spikes in energy, concluding that a fight had broken out. With the Nemesis, the Ark invaded Aquatron managing to dodge the orbital defences and launch an invasion force. After the Quintesson plans had been derailed, the Ark began evacuating the Autobots before towing the Nemesis back into orbit. Once all the crew had boarded, the Ark jumped away from the waterlogged colony, leaving the Decepticons to complete their repairs. Retribution

Prime cartoon

On the run following the destruction of Autobot Outpost Omega One, Jack and Arcee stopped off at a deserted farmhouse for a break where Jack worried the two were all that was left of Team Prime. As Arcee attempted to cheer him up, he asked if there were any other Autobots out there in the galaxy. His guardian answered that though there had been others who escaped on the Ark, the crew was now, like Team Prime, "scattered to the winds". Scattered

Games

Transformers: War for Cybertron (360/PS3/PC)

After defeating Trypticon, Optimus gathered Bumblebee, Ratchet, Ironhide, Jetfire, Air Raid, and Silverbolt around him, telling them he had commissioned a new ship, the Ark, to take them off Cybertron when it was time for them to leave. War for Cybertron

Transformers: War for Cybertron (DS)

"Hey man. We're gonna get up on that big spaceship and get outta here. Wanna come?"

Upon Trypticon's defeat, Optimus said once Megatron's threat was contained on Cybertron, they would leave the planet in the Ark. War for Cybertron

Transformers: Fall of Cybertron

Classified as the first Vanguard-class Deep Space Interceptor (though referred to by Megatron as a "glorified cargo hauler"), the Ark was larger and more streamlined in design than previous galactic transports. According to Sideswipe's evaluations, the Ark possessed insufficient armor plating and was armed with only 16 particle combustion cannons and 16 laser emitters, though a series of twin-barreled pulse cannons were seen to be activated during the Nemesis' attack. It did however possess an "adequate" propulsion system, leading to the conclusion that it was meant to outrun and evade instead of going in guns blazing. The Ark's main purpose was more spiritual than practical: to carry the Autobots' hopes and dreams from a dying Cybertron.

And in that, it succeeded. Despite a surprise attack from the Decepticons that drained the Ark's energon supply and the Combaticons shooting down an Autobot refinery transport carrying the energon from Shockwave's collapsed space bridge tower in the Sea of Rust, the Ark nevertheless launched thanks to the sacrifice of Metroplex, who transferred his entire energon supply into the Ark at the cost of his life. After launching into space, the Ark found itself confronted by the Nemesis and the two ships engaged in a fierce battle that was abruptly concluded when both passed through an unstable space bridge portal. Fall of Cybertron

Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark

As he and Optimus drove towards Kolkular, Jazz pondered letting Megatron keep the Dark Spark in light of their imminent exodus from Cybertron. Optimus responded that the Ark was still under construction and that should Megatron master the dark relic's power, he would doubtlessly use it to destroy their escape ship. Rise of the Dark Spark

Notes

• The Ark, and "Generation One", are, of course, references to the original Ark and Generation 1.
• It is hinted (p. 226-7, 233) that Project Generation One was a contingency plan that had been in place since the Breaking of the Primes and had been a subject of discussion between Prime and Trion after the Core's corruption. Later, Optimus tells Jetfire the Core itself told about Project Generation One (p. 242), though it never uses the term in its entire speech.

References

Foreign names

Japanese: Ark (アーク Āku)