Chapter 456: The Storm is Coming

A satellite has lost contact!

The voice of Huan interrupted Sun Cheng, who was deep in thought, and caused his brow to furrow.

"A satellite lost contact? Which one? What's the situation?"

Sun Cheng and his group also possessed their own satellites in Earth's outer space orbit; after all, since the energy problem at Base No. 2 had been resolved over half a year ago, it had entered a stage of explosive growth.

In order not to let their eyes and ears go deaf, besides deploying radars modified by the hands of the Engineers within Brazil and several South American countries where the Base could radiate, used for detecting Decepticons or Autobots as well as aircraft that might be dispatched by the major military powers on Earth, they had also launched several satellites through various means.

To date, there were over two thousand satellites still in orbit in Earth's outer space, though only about six hundred and fifty were still operational.

Previously, through cooperation with China and Russia, Sun Cheng had used the spacecraft of both countries to launch two satellites each, working for him under the guise of the Russian Glonass and Chinese Beidu satellites in orbit.

These four satellites were things placed in the open; because they were products of cooperation, at least China and Russia knew their true nature, and barring any accidents, they would likely have left a backdoor to take them out at any time.

Sun Cheng was very clear on this point, but there was a tacit understanding between the three parties; unless the Base harmed the national interests of the two countries, they would not easily take action against them.

In addition to these four satellites, the Base had also controlled some companies on Earth, using others to launch three more satellites, also manufactured by Decepticon Engineers, into the sky via the space systems of Europe, Japan, and India.

Those three satellites hidden in the shadows were the Base's most relied-upon and core secrets; on the surface, they were used for hydrological collection, weather forecasting, and satellite communications, but in reality, they were three spy satellites responsible for scouting the military intelligence of various countries on Earth, especially focusing on monitoring the military deployments and military actions of the United States.

Of course, satellites manufactured by Decepticon Engineers naturally could not have only such limited functions.

In fact, several of the spy satellites were equipped with the Dark Spectrum Reconnaissance System; once a Decepticon or Autobot was targeted, it was very difficult for them to escape.

The contact Sun Cheng used with the spy and intelligence networks he had cultivated among humans, out of consideration for concealment, had always been conducted through encrypted satellite communications.

Besides that, the Base actually also controlled four or five satellites by invading the ground receiving stations of satellites and providing high-performance Chips for the satellites of some countries and enterprises.

It was just that those few satellites could not be used easily because, after all, they were not his own; stealing a use at a critical moment was fine, but once discovered, they would likely be lost completely.

Therefore, in a strict sense, the Base

"... 6 minutes ago, satellite A-6 suddenly lost contact with us over the Atlantic Ocean... The moment it lost contact, I had already attempted to awaken the self-check system according to protocol, but there was no response..."

Upon hearing this, Sun Cheng's face suddenly sank, and his mood became even worse.

The longer he stayed in the Transformers universe, the more his way of thinking leaned toward the Decepticons, so the naming of the few satellites was also very simple: A for the serial number, and the number for the launch time.

A-6 was one of the seven satellites controlled by the Base and was also the sixth satellite the Base had launched into the sky.

If Sun Cheng remembered correctly, this satellite was launched into space last November with the help of an Indian carrier rocket and was one of the three spy satellites the Base had hidden in the shadows.

"The satellite only went up at the end of last year, and it was something manufactured by Atlas and the others; it couldn't be a malfunction, something must have gone wrong!"

After deducing countless possibilities that could lead to the satellite losing contact in his mind in an instant, but still finding no leads, he suppressed the irritability in his heart and ordered: "Attempt to awaken the self-destruct device inside the satellite, now... immediately..."

Sun Cheng had already sensed something was wrong. Although he was not yet clear where the problem lay, and the Base had considered the issue of being hijacked or invaded by hostile forces when manufacturing the satellites, if they encountered a very brilliant opponent, the other party could still find many things through clues.

"Yes!"

Huan responded, and the Laboratory immediately fell silent. Clearly, as the current control center of the Base, this Cybertron computer with super-high intelligence had already followed his instructions to awaken the self-destruct device inside the satellite.

It did not make him wait long; only about two minutes later, Huan's slightly puzzled voice sounded in the Laboratory again.

"Master, I cannot awaken the self-destruct device inside satellite A-6; we have completely lost it!"

"Hoo..."

Letting out a long breath, Sun Cheng's expression remained ugly, but his mood was not as bad as he had imagined.

"As expected!"

His emotions had been adjusted, and his voice was much calmer.

"I have probably guessed whose handiwork this is. Fortunately, the ground data receiving station for A-6 is in French Guiana, far away from the Base. You go immediately and clean up the ground data receiving station; it can no longer be used..."

His fist was suddenly clenched until it creaked in an instant, the blue light in Sun Cheng's eyes gradually intensified, and his voice remained calm.

"Yes!"

Huan responded, and the voice disappeared again.

The Laboratory was suddenly left with only Sun Cheng, who was quickly deducing the entire event there.

He was confident that with the anti-satellite reconnaissance technology of various countries on Earth, they might notice the abnormality of A-6 one day, but it was absolutely impossible for them to have discovered or even destroyed this spy satellite manufactured by Decepticon Engineers in just half a year.

Excluding a few possibilities, the target was easy to lock onto: Autobots or Decepticons.

The Autobots were probably still chasing Decepticons all over the world. Among their best intelligence experts, currently only Bumblebee had come to Earth. But compared to the true intelligence gathering expert Lockdown, Bumblebee himself was actually more of an expert skilled in assassination. At least in the intelligence Sun Cheng had collected, there was no performance regarding Bumblebee in intelligence gathering, far less stunning than his continuous and effective assassinations of traitors, so the suspicion of the Autobots could also be temporarily ruled out!

As for the Decepticons...

Several figures flashed through his mind in an instant, and Sun Cheng's face became increasingly ferocious!

Soundwave and his Cassette Corps—at least four of them had come to Earth now.

And Soundwave himself was the premier intelligence expert of the Decepticon Legion; invading, controlling, or even destroying a satellite was easy for him.

If Sun Cheng hadn't guessed wrong, the fact that one of his satellites had lost contact this time absolutely had something to do with him.

At this thought, while feeling a crisis of a storm about to break, a bit of doubt also emerged in his heart.

Was this guy planning to come to his door to settle scores?

Not to mention that he was tricked by him and Starscream last year and nearly lost his life, how could such heavy injuries heal in such a short time?

Just based on Soundwave's loyalty to Megatron, Sun Cheng did not believe that the other party would leave Megatron alone and come to deal with him immediately!

"There must be... there must be something somewhere that I have overlooked..."