Primeless, Part 1 At long, long last, the day has finally arrived: Earth is set to join the Cybertronian Council of Worlds. Elected Earth representative Marissa Faireborn is wished well by Thundercracker as she and the other dignitaries leave via Autobot City's spacebridge, but emotions among the other onlookers are mixed. The G.I. Joes who have to remain behind are grumpy about missing out on a chance at space travel; Stormclash voices her dislike of the way Optimus Prime has turned such an important event into a public spectacle, causing friction with most of the colonist Autobots, who still worship Prime; and Slide angrily denounces everything about the proceedings, disillusioned by the death of her partner Oiler and disgusted at the idea of Cybertronians making peace with former enemies who have killed members of their race in the past. Suddenly, before Aileron can form a response to Slide's angry words, an explosion goes off on Cybertron and the spacebridge shuts down, cutting off all communications from the planet. Blame immediately starts flying between the colonists, the Joes, the Autobots, and the Decepticons, and before things fall irreparably apart, Aileron is forced take command of the situation. She makes everyone put their heads together, and they manage to deduce that the failure is on the Cybertronian end of the bridge, and that nobody present is responsible. Word comes through that G.I. Joe team leader Scarlett is taking a unit to follow up a hunch of hers, so the Joes present head back to their base, while Aileron assigns tasks to everyone else: Jetfire works on getting the bridge back up, Thundercracker heads for Sanctuary Station to make sure all the Decepticons there are accounted for, and Soundwave is placed in command of Autobot City with the Torchbearers acting under him. Slide rankles at Aileron's take-charge attitude, but Aileron has no time for her bitter reproachment—she is on her way to search for the missing Jazz and orders the Colonist Soldiers to accompany her.
News of the events on Cybertron has been seen around the world, and multiple civilians are interviewed on television for their opinions; Jaylin Henry, who saw alliance with Cybertron as a sign of hope; Serena Bharwaney, an old friend of Bumblebee's; Sof?a Orozco, enjoying her station's increased ratings after Jazz's appearance on-air; Jimmy Pink, still bitter; Maki Asato, unsurprised and resigned to the repercussions Earth will suffer; and Bryce Chan, who accepts the existence of good and bad Cybertronians working with good and bad people around the globe as just the way of the world.
Aileron's reasons for bringing the colonists with her are twofold—she wants them out of the way before they do something stupid, but she also really does need help to search for Jazz, still absent after his TV interview gone wrong. The group tracks reports of Transformer activity to Oaxaca, Mexico, but the journey there is an unpleasant one as Slide refuses to let up on her anti-human diatribes, and things only get worse when they attempt to peacefully approach the native humans, only to wind up on the receiving end of fire from black-market Earth Defense Command weaponry. The angry Slide backhands one of the humans, forcing Aileron to order everyone to withdraw from the town.
News spreads on Cybertron, too, where Transformers of all stripes give their opinion on the air. Blurr welcomes and sympathizes with humanity, while Tracks thinks the safety of Cybertron needs to come first. Tappet has no real opinion, having no experience with humans, but Dirge is haunted by the prospect of the same beings who cloned Ramjet and Thrust being allowed onto their homeworld. Flatline considers humans violent creatures in general, while Swift believes violent acts are perpetrated only by a small number of their kind, but that their actions nevertheless only prop up anti-human bigotry on Cybertron.
As Aileron and the colonists regroup, Slide continues her ongoing tirade, now accusing Aileron of being a terrible leader who no longer even believes in Optimus Prime herself. Aileron (haltingly) denies it, insisting that finding Jazz—Prime's friend—is important, and that Prime would want them to do it... but if Jazz is so important, Slide wants to know, why did Optimus leave Earth for Cybertron rather than help him? Roulette steps into stop them arguing, suggesting a course of action that Aileron agrees with: follow the trail of the EDC weaponry back north in the hopes that Jazz is doing the same.
News broadcasts across Earth and the colony worlds each put their own spin on events. On Cybertron, Circuit tells his audience humans have come to the planet to conquer it. On Earth, Brad Emory believes the attack was a Cybertronian ambush on humanity. Caminus prays for Optimus Prime's safety, and Earth's BNN fears for the humans trapped on the planet. A distorted broadcast from an angry Cybertronian blames Starscream for inviting a dangerous race to Cybertron, while Hector Ramirez advocates that the spacebridge be kept closed to prevent more Transformers from arriving on Earth, even though it would mean abandoning the humans already on Cybertron.
Aileron's team goes about their mission in silence, which turns out to be a bad move, as it gives the other colonists time to think about Slide's position and start doubting Aileron's leadership. As a group, they question why they're looking for Jazz when they should be recovering the EDC weaponry from the humans, and realize how Optimus's determination to accomplish the latter has seemingly waned in recent months. Slide thinks she has all the answers: the weapons are Cybertronian tech, meaning that humanity's possession of them could result in the invocation of the Tyrest Accord, a threat that Optimus has used to lobby Earth into joining the council. Now that that's been accomplished, Slide believes, Optimus no longer cares about recovering the weapons, as they are no longer "useful" to his cause. Finding herself pressed further and further into a corner, Aileron is running out of answers, until a sudden explosion of light from the nearby town draws everyone's attention and the answers she needs... because they've just found Jazz, under attack from humans wielding the Cybertronian weapons!
