Golden Disk
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The Golden Disk is a relic from the Beast Wars Transfomers timeline, and a key plot device for the events of the show. Considered a revered artifact, it is actually the Voyager Golden Record, which includes information on Earth and humanity, and is presumably the only source of coordinates for Earth and, thus, a plentiful source of Energon for the Transformers. Unbeknownst to most Cybertronians, though, the disk also included a message from the original Generation One Megatron, calling for any Decepticons still loyal to his cause after his defeat to use then-in development transwarp technology to go back in time and alter the past, ensuring Decepticon victory in the Great War.
Following the end of the war and the planet-wide reformatting that saw the Autobots and Decepticons upgraded into Maximals and Predacons, the Predacons were firmly established as second-class citizens on Cybertron, leading one Predacon criminal, also named Megatron, to search for a new source of energy that might revitalise the Predacon war machine and allow them to conquer the planet. Knowing of the tale that claimed the Golden Disk contained the location of a major Energon deposit, Megatron stole the disk, and uncovered the original Megatron's encoded message. Keeping this particular piece of information to himself, Megatron assembled a small crew of like-minded Predacons and stole a craft, escaping into transwarp space with the Maximals in hot pursuit. When the two ships crashed on prehistoric Earth, only Megatron truly knew where in space and time they were. Locating the Ark, Megatron found himself unwilling to carry out his namesake's extreme plan and re-sealed the tunnel he had dug, opting instead to amass power via the vast amounts of Energon seeded on the planet.
In time, a second Golden Disk was found, this one a creation of the mysterious race of aliens using prehistoric Earth for various experiments. A solid, thick disk, rather than the gold-plated record of the Voyager disk, the alien disk was marked with several symbols which shifted and flowed across its surface which identified the locations of, and allowed the user to control, the various alien devices scattered around the planet. This offered Megatron another alternate opportunity for conquest, as he now sought to control alien technology to wipe out the Maximals. Megatron's former comrade, Dinobot, later stole both disks from Predacon control, but hid the alien disk, returning the Earth disk to Megatron in a show of renewed loyalty once it became clear that they were on Earth. Megatron subsequently stole the alien disk from the Maximals, and put it to use controlling an alien "Metalhunter" base. When the Maximals destroyed the base in a transwarp explosion, the alien disk was also destroyed
No longer able to exploit alien devices, and with his plans to gather Energon faltering, Megatron still remained unwilling to go to the extremes laid out by his predecessor, and opted instead to attempt to alter history through a different means, using the information on the disk to locate and assault the cradle of human civilization, a move that forced Dinobot to go on a suicide mission to stop him, eventually using up the last of his strength to shatter the disk with a final laser-eye blast. This was, however, not the last use of the Golden Disk; after he was captured by Ravage (who was dispatched by order of the Tripredacus Council to find and eliminate all involved in the Beast Wars), Megatron used a fragment of the Earth disk to play back a piece of the original Megatron's message, thus convincing Ravage to release him and join in his schemes.
Considering how reverently the Transformers treat the Earth disk (even going so far as to make it an icon, as shown in Beast Machines), it is likely that it was, in fact, the Transformers' first official contact with humans and, as such, would have a sort of special, almost religious meaning to them. By that token, however, it seems unlikely that it was in any way deeply analyzed, considering that only a very few Transformers knew about the original Megatron's message on it (even Ravage - one of the original Megatron's closest confidants in the Great War - didn't know about it until Beast Wars Megatron showed it to him), so the true nature of the Transformers' near-worship of the artifact is debatable. One argument being that it was known to the maximals that it contained co-ordinates of a source of much raw energon, with them being oblivious to Megatrons message.
The 2006 Iacon One convention held in Fort Wayne, Indiana included as souvenir gifts for registered attendies a set of replica Golden Disks (see below).
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