A sweet yet unsettling tradition among the Autobots — when measuring the height of their sparklings, they carve a mark directly onto their own frames.
Back in the early days of the war, Autobots still had sparklings — their own, or those they managed to rescue during Decepticon raids or city bombings.
As the sparklings grew, adult bots would measure them at intervals to track changes in height. The growth marks were etched into the walls or doors of their dwellings. But as the war escalated, it became painfully clear that even the safest homes were only temporary.
They were destroyed — sometimes along with the Autobots and their sparklings. Sometimes the adults or the children perished. Sometimes everyone managed to escape, but the dwellings were still obliterated.
Optimus was one of the first to grasp this grim truth, and it was he who began this tradition.
When it came time to measure the height of one of his sparklings, instead of using a wall or a door, he told the young bot to come stand beside him and stretch up to their full height. As the bewildered sparkling did so under equally puzzled gazes, Optimus transformed one of his servos into a blade and carved the mark directly into his own frame — followed by the glyphs of the sparkling’s name.
The higher command and the other sparklings present were horrified, but Optimus quickly explained his decision. He wanted to preserve the memory of these moments in a way that nothing and no one could destroy. And what could safeguard those memories better than his own body?
They were still deeply unsettled — yet his reasoning, while profoundly distressing, was strikingly logical.
Since all of Optimus’s sparklings were shared with Ratchet, the medic insisted on doing the same himself.
He didn’t just ask, he demanded it, with a tone that brooked no argument. If Optimus could carry the memories etched into his own frame, Ratchet would carry them too.
Over time, those close to the pair — and who had sparklings of their own — began doing the same. Eventually, other Autobots took notice, and the practice spread throughout the ranks.
Some initially carved the marks into weapons roughly the size of a full-grown bot — cannons, axes, hammers with long handles, or greatswords. But even the finest weapon could be destroyed in battle, or taken by Decepticons as a trophy. So before long, most Autobots bore sets of marks on their own bodies, each accompanied by glyphs denoting age or names.
Many had lost their sparklings, and sometimes, those marks were all they had left.
When Autobots were dying, they often looked at the carvings — symbols of the sparklings they'd lost or those who are still alive, or have already grown up. Medics or comrades would later say that, in that moment they smiled.
The Decepticons learned about this practice during interrogations of captured Autobots — and found a new form of amusement.
They would mock the prisoners, reading each mark and noting how high the last one was. Often, if the name glyph remained very low, it meant the sparkling was dead. The Decepticons always tried to extract the details: how it happened, under what circumstances, whether the sparkling had suffered. All for the sake of inflicting deeper emotional torment.
Among the particularly sadistic ones, some would destroy the marks — or cut off pieces of Autobot armor that bore them, keeping those fragments as trophies.
On Earth, only Optimus and Ratchet among the Autobots carried such marks. Each of them bore six identical sets of height lines, accompanied by glyphs denoting age and names.
Miko was the first to notice — and of course, she drew everyone’s attention to it. The bots were already aware, so they didn’t react much. But the humans were genuinely intrigued and naturally wanted to know what the markings meant.
To them, it looked like something ceremonial, or maybe sentimental — but the story behind it was heavier than they could’ve imagined.
Optimus, of course, explained the meaning — and even pointed out that one of the sets belonged to Bumblebee.
For both him and Ratchet, the very first mark was etched near the bottom of their pede, while the most recent one sat high on their chest plating.
In addition to Bumblebee’s set, they had five other series of markings. People noticed that one of them, just like the rest, began near the base of the pede — but the final mark and its familiar glyphs were etched only slightly above the knee.
But everyone understood why.
Arcee, caught in a strange wave of melancholy and nostalgia, remembered that Tailgate had two sets of height marks. Both ended at the level of his thighs.
And Airachnid never gave him the chance to look at them one last time before she killed him.
Some time after Smokescreen joined the team, Ratchet and Optimus each gained another set of marks and glyphs.
By the end of their time on Earth, every bot bore such markings.
Bulkhead, Wheeljack, and Ultra Magnus had height marks for Miko. Arcee and Smokescreen carried those of Jack. And Bumblebee, Ratchet, and Optimus - Rafael.
