My headcanon is that they shed their antlers every season, and each antler then grows into a new deer.

Trying out this zine thing with an interest check for the world wide web!

A freely distributed collaborative documentation focused not on the robots in disguise, but the mechanoid animals that lived alongside them. From the ferocious Pneumalion to the humble robotopossum, this 'zine' hopes to chronicle at least a fraction of the myriad of lifeforms of Cybertron's many hidden biomes. We will chronicle their nature, preserve their history, and show there is more to Cybertron than societal strife or endless warfare.

Further information seen here; Cybertronic Beastiary Q&A

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As the Empire State Building shows, they're absolutely massive, and their alt mode is equally gargantuan. Native to Cybertron's scattered but expansive oceans, they transform into habitable submarines, but only seem to do so when coming across bots caught out at sea. There are many stories of them rescuing the victims of shipwrecks, ferrying them to shore in their altmode, and then dissapearing back to the depths when all are safe.

As the different seas have vastly different chemical compositions, their colors vary to match the general palette of their domain.

As their tendency towards rescue demonstrates, these creatures are incredibly gentle by nature, and may well be sentient. They actively avoid contact and don't respond to any attempts at communication, so confirming this has been impossible. What is known about their lives tells us how they care for the oceans. Using their massive horn to till the ocean floor, they stir up nutrients in the volcanic depths, and their powerful fins generate healthy currents for other sea life to utilize. Like the whales of earth, they are moving ecosystem stabilizers, and those fortunate enough to encounter them describe the experience as profound.

Mechanical Claws slam into Ice and Snow alike. The whir of complex mechanimal engine parts ripple up from one of the snowy caps of Highmountain only to become lost in the howling wind of the snowstorm ranging just inches overhead. The FBX-99’s headlight eyes look back and forth, scanning the visible landscape before identifying a suitable local to hunker down and it proceeds to sprint towards a ravine that would at least allow it to initiate its heating sequences to make sure nothing was freezing internally and to give its rider some shelter from the storm before they continued on.

Megahes leans in, holding onto the metal armor that surrounded the mechanical creation, patting its snow and ice clinging body as if encouraging it. He was thankful for the armor he wore, inspired by the Hunters during the Northrend Campaign and outfitted and specialized with a great number of additional engineering benefits now that Mega got his hands on its design. His suit kept him warm, sure, at least to a degree. At least frostbite wasn’t a concern, but the chill could still get to him if he didn’t stop to rest and warm up properly often enough, especially up in these altitudes. His visor blinks as shards and scraps of metal are pinged just below the fresh snow, causing Mega’s display to whir out with a sonar like ripple. This causes him to pull back on the reins of the X-99 as his body goes rigid. He was supposed to rendezvous with the scouts who found one of his Rogue Mechanimal Dog units here but everything he was picking up was. No. Something happened here. He climbs off the X-99 and looks about, patting its side as he yells over the howling winds. “Defensive Perimeter Protocols, Fifty Yards. Electro-Claws activate on energy signature acquisition of targets designated as Caustic, Bass, or Jet. Fall back on my position on detection of aggressive intrusions.” The Mechanicat pounced off and was quickly lost in the storm and Megahes began to trudge through the snow to depths clear up to his neckline. “Fawkin Snow and… god damned… genetics.” He grunts, pushing through, using his arms to clear what he can ahead of him. Wham! He trips, taking a visor full of snow. “Fuckin rocks!” He hollers out, irritated as he goes to stand up, brushing himself off the snow and ice bits to look around. In that moment, the storm's howling winds and snow subsides, if but for a moment and the sight before makes him freeze more than any freezing temperature can.

Bodies of the scouts, frozen in time, as crimson snow and ice mark their petrified bodies and the gore torn from them. Now he understood all that metal he was picking up.

Dear Convergence Cogitator,

One of the fascinating parts of life is how such coincidences emerge. It seems many times that particular niches produce similar beings, despite such different origins. Let us take the humble porcineacon for example, analogues have been found on Quartex and Hydrus IV and even organic equivalents exist on worlds such as Kronos, Elonia, and Earth.

At first this may seem ridiculous. If the universe is infinite, why are similar creatures emerging time after time? But of course, morphology is correlated to suitability. A porcineacon's drills allow it to search for subsurface energon conduits and insecatrons on which to feed. Its olfactory sensor is enlarged to allow for maximum input, while its chassis is covered with a series of sensor spines that stand erect when the beast detects a threat. Likewise the bodies of narlihogs and targs are suited for their lifestyles, and although each has their own variations due to their native biology and ancestors, their ecological niches have ensured convergent evolution has taken place.