Sky-Byte

Sky-Byte is either a Predacon or ex-Decepticon from the Generation 1 continuity family.

Fiction
Created as an agent of the Quintessons, Sky-Byte is the commander of the new generation of Sharkticons. Unlike his dim-witted troops, Sky-Byte exhibits a scientific and creative nature, whether it be by making new advances in technology or writing haiku to express himself during tense and exciting moments.

In 2010, Sky-Byte was sent to Earth by the Quintessons as part of an alliance with the Decepticon outlaw Clench. His army of next-generation Sharkticons successfully empowered Clench’s Decepticon Syndicate, and they were able to take control of the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland.

There, Sky-Byte worked with Clench to realize the potential of the low-grade fuel forestonite. He determined that bombarding the forestonite with high-energy particles allowed it to alter Transformers, granting them extraordinary power. Pyro teased Clench for hanging around with Quintesson flunkies, and Sky-Byte responded with pride about how his new forestonite fuel would tip the balance of power. Sky-Byte may have oversold the stuff, however, as Clench impulsively fed some to Cindersaur—and it wasn't meant to be taken orally!—and then insisted that Sky-Byte himself be one of the next round of test subjects.

When the Autobots burst into the facility in an attempt to rescue Spark, Sky-Byte taunted them with a haiku and, when that was poorly received, then tried to zap them all with his "Tsunami Blaster", a new and deadly ability bestowed upon him by the forestonite. The battle was ultimately decided when a nervous Breakdown shot the canisters of forestonite, thinking they would explode. Instead, the chemical spread out in gaseous form all over the remaining Transformers, equaling the balance of power for the Autobots. Rapido gained the power to outrun Sky-Byte's shark missile attack, and soon the Decepticons were thoroughly routed. At this point, Sky-Byte fled the scene with his Sharkticons and a sample of forestonite. Without his additional muscle, Clench was forced to retreat as well.

And, yes, even while running for his life, Sky-Byte had the frame of mind to write a pretty haiku.

Two years later, Sky-Byte teamed up with Jhiaxus, providing the Decepticon with large quantities of forestonite. A Flash Forward, Part 2 His duties included preparing the ship for takeoff to Nebulos. He was almost run down by Side Burn as the latter drove through the base, prompting him to shoot a furious haiku at the Autobot. Following the destruction of Jhiaxus's base, Sky-Byte and his master watched the Autobots leave with several of the clones, and Jhiaxus confided in him that the whole experience had been a test.

More than four million years ago, Sky-Byte was a Decepticon, but atrocities committed by the Constructicons on Varas Centralus convinced him to flee the war and his homeworld. Before Sky-Byte's retreat, he had a rivalry with Ironhide.

In the current era, Cybertron was rebooted into a primordial state and Vector Sigma sent out a signal to its planet's scattered people to return. Sky-Byte heeded this call, but had reservations about the uneasy politics between the Autobots, the Decepticons, and the nonaffiliated. The ex-Decepticon poet pursued some solitude, musing over a decapitated Sweep, when he was interrupted by Ironhide. Sky-Byte expected a fight from his old rival, but Ironhide surprised him with his ease and candor. Still, Sky-Byte expressed his suspicions towards the Autobots, and so Ironhide suggested he check out the Decepticons as well to see if they were any better. Sky-Byte followed Ironhide's suggestion and met with the Decepticons, but he was followed by Prowl's Autobots so that they could make arrests. Things quickly got out of hand and a battle erupted until Ironhide settled everyone down.

Later, Sky-Byte joined Prowl for a drink at Maccadam's Old Oil House, which Ironhide and Blurr had re-opened as a place where Transformers could meet in peace regardless of affiliation. Ironhide explained to them why he had changed -- he had seen a vision of the distant future where he was alive but the war was dead... because so were Sky-Byte, Prowl, and the rest of the Autobots and Decepticons. Sky-Byte was later performing a musical/poetic duet with Jazz at Maccadam's Old Oil House. Sky-Byte told Starscream some poetry and was among a Cybertronian crowd recruited by the Decepticon to pressure Prowl into revealing one of his secret discoveries below ground on Cybertron. Later underground, they witnessed a Metrotitan declare that Starscream was the Cybertronian destined to unite their whole race. He and the other Cybertronians celebrated afterwards with Starscream.