Lover of the Fantastical

I know you said you're busy so I hope this doesn't sound pushy, I would just like you to know that whenever you have time I would LOVE to hear about it!

I would love to share!

(For those lacking context check out @keferon’s Mimics au comic)

Rungs being responsible adults until Y/N is around, at which point they will act like little kids. Especially when it's just them and Y/N.

Y/N: C’mon sweetie, you have to wake up. You have a bunch of patients to take care of today!

SG Rung: But I don't wannnna, lemme go back to sleep.

Y/N: Well, it's either you listen to me and get up, or your older brother gets to pour the rest of my water bottle onto your head-

SG Rung: I'M UP I'M UP I'M UP!

Y/N, exasperated: For the tenth time, you need to eat something hon! At this rate you'll keel over before noon!

OG Rung: I know, I know, just five more minutes, please? I need to finish this paper on how recharge disorders are often linked to pre-existing mental issues!

Y/N: You know what? I tried. *looks up* Sweetie, it's time for Plan B.

OG Rung: Wait wha-

SG Rung, kicking off the grate of the ceiling vent and pointing the cybertronian equivalent of a paintball gun at his brother: PUT THE DATAPAD DOWN AND YOUR HANDS UP!

OG Rung, quickly doing as he's told: ALRIGHT, ALRIGHT, I'M GOING!

I remember you talking about holidays with the Rungs and Primes, and you read my mind. Y/N was their Santa, and the Rungs didn't know Santa wasn't real until like, a week or so before they went off to their worlds. They were so upset but also kinda impressed at how much Y/N did just to keep the act up and get them what they wanted. The reason Y/N told the Rungs was because they saw them getting their own planet and being more independent as them truly stepping into adulthood, and Y/N knew they couldn't keep believing in Santa forever. They were passing the torch in a way. The Rungs did their best to keep the magic alive for the Primes, and I think it would be absolutely hilarious if they found out on accident after the reunion when the Rungs and Y/N were doing stuff for Christmas together. Cue the giant and revered Primes losing their minds over finding out Santa was actually fake all along. (Maybe a Christmas gift that Y/N gave them was a Lego spaceship? Could be the start of their diorama collections)

(Tbh imo i think they'd be a lot more matured since they're old asf now, maybe still have some harmless rivalry but more verbal/friendly passive aggression. But hey, I'll roll with this ask)

Fr grown ass mechs, I bet SG!Rung still use the illegal sibling move when they fight.

My god imagine them just stealing eachother's snacks or armor pieces (similar to how siblings steals eachother's clothes). Y/n is so used to their squawking that it'd be weird not to hear the two squabbles.

Y/n giving the Rungs lego spaceship as their Christmas present is def the start of their interest in spaceship figurine collecting.

The dark side of Jazz. "Being Jazz's enemy" simulator.

The dark side of Jazz. "Being Jazz's enemy" simulator.

Optimus and Megatron alone. Optimus is leaning against a tree, intent eyeing Megatron.

Megatron: What is it Prime…

Optimus: *optics narrowing* hmm

Megatron: *getting uncomfortable* Prime…

Optimus: *slowly stalks forward*

Megatron: *thinks Optimus is trying to attack him and transforms*

Optimus: *rushes forward and jumps on Megatron’s back*

Megatron: *absolutely confused* Wha—What?! What are you doing?! GET OFF!

Basically. He is like Connor from "Detroit become human" and Garnet from "Steven Universe" in one person. TacNet allows him to calculate possible variations of future events based on the information he has but also it lets him simulate possible variations of events that already happened while he wasn't there.

It's like. Imagine if you want to build some mechanism in your game but you don't want to mess it up so you create a separate save file and make a bunch of test runs to see which results you'll get? Before returning to your main save with new knowledge?

This is basically the same I believe.

Whenever Prowl needs to calculate something he sorta opens a separate save file inside his head and does a lot of different test runs to see how everything works out.

That is. OF COURSE. How it's described in canon. It described as a super interesting tool with tons of incredible opportunities but 99% of the time the writers ignore it ang go "I dunno he's super smart. Sometimes. When it's convenient tehee"

Chapter 1: The Accident

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It came too quick, way too quick. Whatever the hell was happening with the ground, those spikes, and the train... it was a total wipeout.

D-16 got up and frantically looked around for the others. He managed to yank B-127 out of the ground and got Elita up... but where was Orion? He couldn't be far, could he? Did he wander off without them? Sounded like something he would do... but Orion also didn't like leaving friends behind, so maybe not.

D-16 looked around in a panic until he eventually found Orion. He was glad to have found him at first... but then his fuel tank dropped. What he saw... this couldn't be real, he refused to believe it, it just... couldn't be happening! But... it was.

Orion was impaled by a spike right through the spark. He was gone. Offline. Optics off and sparkbeat silent.

"No... nonononono... Pax..."

D-16 ran to his side and frantically shook him, desperate for him to be alive somehow, begging and pleading to Primus not to take him from him. Not his Pax, not now, not when they haven't even found the matrix yet, he knew how much this meant to him.

"Orion! Orion please, you can't go, not like this! Please, wake up!"

He choked out through tears. This was his worst nightmare. Elita went to him and yanked him away, knowing it was no use.

"Stop! Stop... it's no use. He's gone. Nothing can bring him back now..."

D-16 sighed. It hurt but... she was right. Nothing would bring him back. Elita then spoke again.

"Now, clearly, the surface is way too dangerous and we should get back to-"

"No."

D-16 stood up, a determined glint in his eye as he took their only lead for the matrix from Orion's now cooling frame. There was still a mission to complete that he knew Orion wanted him to keep going for without him.

"We're going to get that matrix. Orion wanted to find it and save our home more than anything. I'm not going to give up on this now that he's gone. We need to do this... I need to do this... for him."

"But with even less of us, it's even more dangerous out here! We can't stay here!"

B-127 shook his head.

"I'm with Dee on this one. It's the right thing to do, he was a friend and this was his wish!"

Elita groaned, but reluctantly agreed to keep going. She knew even she would not make it alone here and she knew B-127 would just follow D-16 and she'd be alone. So they continued on the journey.

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Orion woke up with a groan, looking around. Where was everyone? Why did he feel so weird? Like... floaty and light. Eh, it was probably nothing. He got up and started looking around. He soon found the others and ran up to them.

"Dee! Bee! Elita! Damn, I gotta come up with a nickname for her that matches the other two... Li? Does Li sound good Elita?"

He walked up to her as she walked. She didn't respond. Was she mad at him? She was probably mad at him...

"Hey, are you ignoring me because of the accident? I'm sorry, I didn't know that would happen! Li? Elita?"

Orion then walks over to D-16 as he keeps walking. Surely, D-16 would listen to him, right?

"Dee, can you tell her to stop ignoring me? Dee? D-16? Oh, not you, too... I-"

As he went to grab his arm, his hand phased right through him. He froze in his tracks. He couldn't touch anyone...

"...what? Wait, what's going on? Why can't I-"

And then he caught a glimpse of his body.

"...is that me? Wait... am I dead?!"

Orion panicked. He couldn't leave D-16 like that! They needed each other! How could this happen? Maybe they shouldn't have gone to the surface after all...

"At least Dee is continuing on for me... but I can't go yet. I'm still going with him, even if he can't see me... I'll still have his back, some way, somehow..."

With that, his spirit kept following the others as they continued their journey

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Really short first chapter, but I had to get it started at least.

Here’s a timeline summary of all the known Eras of Cybertronian history from Transformers Prime!

It doesn’t contain a whole lot of detail, as this is just intended to be used as a general reference, but it’s nice to see how each era does overlap with the next; It flows in canon like an actual timeline of events, and doesn’t skip around as much as you might think! 

For example, Ratchet was online during the Age of Wrath, as it is noted in the Covenant of Primus that he treated one of the first Cybertronians to present to medical services with signs of Quintesson manipulation. We don’t know when he came online exactly, but he was definitely already alive and was mature enough to be practicing medicine during this time.

But Orion Pax states in one of the novels (I believe the first one?) that he never got to see the original colonial expansion space bridges in operation, which means he had to have come online sometime during the Age of Rust.

So Ratchet is a very old friend, indeed– Given that he was already mature during the Age of Wrath, and we know that he was around before the development of Iacon as a fully realised city-state (he was one of the first students of Remedy and had to walk to Iacon from Vaporex, hinting that this was before roadways were constructed in most places if at all)– 

–It is entirely possible that Ratchet was one of the early Cybertronian sparklings that came out of the Well and had to enter stasis during the Cataclysm, coming up from stasis shelter underground in what would be known as Vaporex, although his dialogue in the show regarding Predacons may somewhat challenge that theory. (I need to dig up the episode script to check!) 

Either way, holy shit, Ratchet is old. Quite literally possibly as old as “dinosaurs”; The dialogue in the show may not be as contradictory as it might seem, as we know that natural memory lapse to save processor space and file integrity is something that can occur in this continuity as well, if I recall correctly–

–So it’s very possible that Ratchet just doesn’t remember his sparkling days very well, or those memory files may have been prone to information creep which was established in IDW 1 and may have been a concept that was already floating around when the writers for TFP were working on building the lore for this series as well. 

Anyway, it’s 4 AM so I’m gonna go make some tea, LOL 

I hope this is helpful for some people out there! :) <3

CULTURE - gender, arts & fashion

Cybertronian culture has many aspects to it that are rather fluid. The ideas of gender, race, religion and expression are very dynamic for them when compared to organic species but are made rigid only due to their current governing authority. The culture varies from colony to colony but there are many common uniting ideas.

One such is the idea of gender. Now, according to canon, mech is actually a gender-neutral term but it has been used as a masculine equivalent while a fanon term ‘femme’ exists for feminine. But these terms would not be sufficient to explain the elaborate idea of gender expression amongst the transformer kind. The idea of gender is a new one that emerged during the time of Nova Prime but it was one that most bots didn’t mind and actually thought was kind of cool. Until then, they sort of just existed in whatever they looked like. Cybertronians have their frames created randomly due to which the ratio of feminine looking and masculine appearing bots are near equal. But the idea of categorization and labels made it easier for bots to identify. There exists a spectrum of gender expression and the word bot is often used as a general term for Cybertronians. Until the Autobot-Decepticon war where the word ‘Bot’ was claimed by the Autobots, a term ‘mecha’ was introduced.

Moving on to solely Cybertron.

The planet is very diverse with different cities that have their own accents, styles, celebrations, fashion and lingo. The city of Iacon is the capital and hence considered the more refined out of the rest of Cybertron. The upper north of Cybertron is mainly filled with technologically advanced megacities that most of the upper class of Cybertron lives in. Cities like Iacon, Vos and Harmonex are located there. Meanwhile, down south, there exist industrial cities with mines, refineries and factories where the lower classes toil in for energon scraps. This is just a general overview. This does not imply that Iacon doesn’t have a population of lower-caste bots. They do. Iacon and Vos have docks that are staffed with dock-workers and delivery bots. After all, the grandeur of the upper class mecha are brought to life through the sufferings of the lower classes. However, most of these lower class bots in the fancy cities usually dwell in its outskirts.

These radically different living conditions produce radically different cultures amongst the different classes. The upper castes of Cybertron have easy access to the arts. Various theatres where plays are held along with massive stages for musicians to perform are all across Northern Cybertron, especially Harmonex which is somewhat of the cultural capital of Cybertron.

The lower castes have no easy access to any of the old traditional works that their predecessors have left for them so they resort to making their own art, their creativity is likited by means. Many contemporary art forms and new styles of literature exist among dock workers, manual labourers, service bots and miners— each with their own take and personality to it. Music is often sung in unison as the dock workers of Iacon load and unload cargo or the factory workers of Kaon hit their hammers against metal in a rhythmic pace. They have no other pleasantries in life. Workers use their equipment and bang on various surfaces with different densities, creating sounds akin to that of drums— music is often made this way. In the glassmaking factories, they use glass to make different tunes and pitches.

But many of the lower class aren’t built-in with language chips, especially after The Senate began mass producing mecha. There’s only so much metal to make chips and modules so an unfortunate consequence is that most are illiterate in the lowest castes, especially in the miner class (this is an important thing to note). Mostly the older models have better skills in things other than just mining.

This takes us to a different form of self-expression other than literature and music— fashion. Fashion amongst Cybertronians and most mechanical species revolves mainly around plating types, paints and accessories. Most of the lower-class mecha can’t afford the fancy accessories and paints but despite this, they make an effort to look good through servo-made accessories to hook on or stick on to their frame. Some use cheap dye to make their optics have different colours. Paints are usually stolen.

Meanwhile, the higher classes of bots go over the top with their sense of style. Fancy high tensile metal fibre mended into regal capes, plating with different textures that are coated in a variety of paints to make it really pop, accents and bioluminescent paints or dangling accessories to attack to their helm pieces; Cybertronians can be quite creative when it comes to modifying their frames fashionably, each revolving around individualistic style. There also exists plating textures where plating of a bot is made to look designer with different texture add ons, creating a new sensation when touched.

There are some unconventional styles in the realm of Cybertronian fashion that involve things like paints on their faceplates, it is a large part of Camien culture and religion though. Some are inspired from the sense of style in the colony worlds or foreign cultures, though it isn’t exactly encouraged and is generally looked down upon. Main-stream trends change depending on the cities.

Not to mention, different frame-classes often have different ways of accessorising due to the nature of their frame types and even different cultures.

However, most of Cybertron's rich fashion culture was wiped away when the war started. It was deemed to be impractical and as a show-off. It's one of Cybertron's many lost cultural aspects. However, remnants of this sense of style remain alive in colonies like Caminus and Eukaris.

2. GEOGRAPHY - cities -> part 1

The major cities of Cybertron include: Iacon, Harmonex, Kaon, Petrex, Tarn, Vos, Helex, Tesarus, Tetrahex, Praxus, Stanix, Polyhex, Nyon, Darkmount and Straxus. They are divided into North and South as stated before— Northern cities being mainly places of culture and scientific advancements and the cities down South being industrial factories that fuels and powers the scientific progress of Cybertron.

Northern cities include: Iacon, Harmonex, Polyhex, Stanix, Tetrahex, Vos, Petrex and Praxus.

Southern cities include: Tarn, Kaon, Helex, Straxus, Darkmount, Nyon and Tesarus.

Nyon lies in between the lines of North and South but is considered mainly an industrial city.

Each city is unique in its own right.

Iacon is the capital city, a cradle of scientific progress. It was once called Cyber City, a long, long time ago before the Primes. Iacon is the oldest city and where most of Cybertron’s politically and religiously important structures stand— such as the Senate building, the Primal Basillica and so on.

Vos is one of the most unique. Majority of its inhabitants are Seeker class warriors with the advantage of flight. This unique flight frame was developed because of the nature of Vossian terrain, high cliffs and steep mountains that go deep into chasms.

Darkmount is a military base, ground-based warrior frames set up their barracks. It was thriving during Nova’s conquests— docks and markets thriving with soldiers returning from their slaughter up in the stars. But after the era of conquest fell, it reverted to being nothing more than a military headquarters.

Kaon is the city of factories, it's the closest to Darkmount and during Nova’s expansion, it produced tons of weapons and ammunitions to Darkmount. It remains as the weapons production capitol of Cybertron.

Tarn is primarily energon rich lands filled with mines. Most of its inhabitants are usually miners or low ranking military foot-soldiers. Tarn is, in a way, the metaphorical spark of Cybertron— majority of the planet's fuel originates from this area.

The sadness suits you.