In time, word of Nominus's death was released to the public; although the Prime's passing was attributed to a rust infection, when Shockwave met with Orion and his friend Ratchet, he was able to confirm that the Senate had their head of security Sentinel kill Nominus when the Matrix within him proved to be a fake. Post Hoc Soon after, Pax received a tip-off from revenge-seeking former Senate agent Whirl of a plot that was soon to claim Shockwave's life, so Pax had Ratchet and Roller visit the Academy of Advanced Technology and take him into protective custody. Along with Pax's other allies, Shockwave was able to provide enough evidence to help Orion figure out that the Senate had turned the fake Matrix in Nominus's body into a bomb that they would detonate as his body lay in state, which they could blame on the trouble-making Decepticon movement, an underground organization advocating the dissolution of the functionist regime. Patternism Shockwave gathered three of his outlier students, Skids, Glitch, and Windcharger, to help with the theft of the Matrix-bomb, but he himself was kept under guard in case things went wrong. Shockwave laughed that off, thinking he was too high profile for Sentinel to assassinate, but in the midst of the heist, he found out how wrong he was when Senate thugs burned down the Academy and broke into the safehouse intending to capture him: Sentinel had found out about the army of outliers and was very unhappy. While Orion Pax was willing to fight to save Shockwave, the senator willingly went with his captors rather than allow Roller to be killed in his name. The captive Shockwave was taken to the Institute and subjected to "Shadowplay", the emotion centers of his brain cut out by mnemosurgery to change his entire personality, turning him from a fiery crusader into an emotionless husk. To add insult to injury, Proteus and Sentinel had empurata performed on him, taking away his face and hands, replacing them with a featureless mask and claws solely out of spite.
