I had a sudden idea while watching ROTF (please don't kill me)

I got this idea from the Energon machine that the Decepticons were about to activate and destroy the sun in order to harness the energy.

Anyway, now that we have the plots for the first six episodes of G1 out of the way (No, really. If you examine all of the elements of both the movies it's summed up by the titles of the first six G1 episodes.) Anyway...since I do not like the Dinobots and Devastator has been put out of commission, I figured the ultimate big-bad for this fic would be the tried and true of the Transformers universe.

Unicron.

Bear with me.

Assuming that the machine inside the Giza pyramid is not unique and also assuming that Sam would have been tapped to transcribe everything in his head down on paper or some other medium, the subject of Unicron will eventually pop up.

Let us say that for the sake of argument that the history that the All Spark had in it mentions two pivotal beings instrumental in the creation of the Transformers; Primus and Unicron.

Philosophical anecdotes aside, let us also take another device from G1; The Quintessons. Generally speaking, the concept that the Transformers were originally created as servants to the Quintessons and through subsequent generations gained enough self awareness to rebel against their masters.

This is where Primus and Unicron come into the picture. Both were machines created by the Quintessons in order to facilitate the manufacture of the Transformers for their needs; be they War, Research, Entertainment, Transportation and so on. Assuming that both beings were tied into the All Spark, which is where the accumulated knowledge of billions of generations was stored, both Primus and Unicron would have had a large role in shaping the personalities of those they created.

Let us also assume that they grew weary of their 'children' being used like toilet paper and began to give their creations some semblance of what we would call 'humanity'. A conscience. Morals. What ever you wish to call it, it was given to the Transformers.

They arose and cast off the yoke of their masters domination and took charge of their own destiny.

Now let us also assume that since there were two beings responsible for creating the Transformers that there would be two main views on how best to move on.

These may have been mere differences of opinion at first, easily debated and compromised on. The culture that grew from the ashes of their revolution would have been a sight to see. But all civilizations go through cycles. Even Cybertronian civilization. We could see the institution of a caste system over many generations. It may have been as subtle as here in the US with the Lower-Middle-Upper class structure with free mobility between the levels.

Or it could have been as rigid as the caste system in India with the lowest level being something like an 'Untouchable' where any kind of atrocity could be visited upon them and no one would care. In fact it would be reinforced by the belief that they had somehow done this to themselves or their ancestors had committed a crime of such magnitude that it warranted them to be cast down out of true civilization. It could have been any degree of both.

What matters is that now these differences of opinion have gone from lively debate to blood feuds. There may be those who remember when the Transformers were nothing but servants and feel as though one side or the other is slowly pushing things back that way. Jetfire from ROTF said that being an Autobot or Decepticon was an 'intensely personal choice'. Assuming that holds true, then the battle lines were being drawn already.

The match that lit the powder-keg that started the whole war could have been the being known forevermore as 'The Fallen'. This Prime would have had followers to back up his bold decision to defy the other 6 Primes and building the Energon harvester on Earth. The whole war would have escalated into chaos when the other 6 Primes sealed up the key to the machine with their own bodies.

Now these Primes were not stupid, nor were they power hungry. They appointed new Primes to take their places after their sacrifice. One of them being Sentinel Prime who in turn passed his power on to Optimus Prime.

Now here we are, several years after ROTF.

Betelgeuse has just gone super nova. Not surprising in and of itself. What is surprising is that the energy that should be radiating outward is being sucked into a central point on a large planet that orbited the now dead star. Now since Betelgeuse is 640 light-years away, this of course happened 640 years ago.

Why?

Let us assume that after the war broke out and the All Spark sent off into space, that Primus and Unicron no longer saw eye to eye on the subject of their 'children'. Unicron sided with what was to become known as the Decepticons; citing that his children should rule the universe as they wished.

Primus sided with the group that would come to be known as the Autobots; knowing that committing the atrocities of their ancestors masters was not the way to become great. The All Spark was their binding force. It was what allowed both to understand both sides of history. But now, with it's disappearance, they could no longer agree on anything, so they chose to part.

This may have been what the Autobots referred to when they mention the destruction of their world. The two, Primus and Unicron together, were what allowed the planet to function. The All Spark was what allowed them to create new Transformers with all the knowledge they would need to function. With that bond gone, Transformers created afterward would be nothing but spark-less shells. Drones, if you will.

Back to Betelgeuse. The whole war was started when one of the Primes decided to build a harvester on a planet with life. This Energon is the fuel that keeps the Transformers functioning for so many eons. It was also what kept Primus and Unicron functioning. Now Betelgeuse is a big star. A really, really, really big star. Think of how a farmer fattens up a hog before slaughtering it for meat.

Now think of Unicron as that farmer and Betelgeuse as that hog. Now wonder; if Unicron is that close, what is to stop Megatron from contacting it and convincing it that the only way to secure it's children's survival is to destroy the star that the Autobot's allies planet orbits around?

What follows is Autobots battling Decepticons in space against one of their own creators in order to keep that being from destroying the star that Earth orbits around.

Now, as for Primus and Unicron, neither would have a humanoid transformation. In fact, neither would transform.

Let us go back to the histories that Sam has transcribed. In those histories would be clues to how to defeat both Primus and Unicron should one need to do so. But it would also have a little tid bit of information on how to continue to produce Transformers without either Primus or Unicron.

Now don't get me wrong. There is no humanoid methods of reproduction. The activity may be pleasurable, however there are no screaming O-faces or humping like rabbits. It is pleasant in the way that a good deep tissue massage is pleasant.

It involves a cable that extends from one spark chamber to a device just below a femmes spark chamber. The two, having a mix of both Primus and Unicron in their personalities would be able to create a third being that is a random mix of both of their personalities. Though anything beyond that is based on the created being's talents and wants. The task complete, the new being would be allowed to stabilize and mature inside the femmes body until such a time as it can sustain itself in it's own shell. That is it.

Now, since the secret of the Transformers is out, there would be those who would identify with one side or the other. There would be many Decepticon sympathizers as well as Autobot sympathizers. The choice would be intensely personal.

I would imagine that there would be no magical unification of all peoples under one banner in an effort to defeat Unicron and the Decepticons. I imagine it would throw much of the world into civil war. I am imagining a conflict on an epically grand scale. Even the US military is split on how best to approach this new threat.

The outcome would not be happily ever after. Nothing ever is. What it would be is an uneasy truce between the waring factions on Earth and what is left of the Transformers.

If I have bored you, I apologize. But when I think of a fic, I think of it in terms of past, present and future.

What do you think?

I think...

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Therefore you have...Wheelie big 'tires'?

Alright, I think I can contribute now.

Mythandariel wrote:

These may have been mere differences of opinion at first, easily debated and compromised on. The culture that grew from the ashes of their revolution would have been a sight to see. But all civilizations go through cycles. Even Cybertronian civilization. We could see the institution of a caste system over many generations. It may have been as subtle as here in the US with the Lower-Middle-Upper class structure with free mobility between the levels.

Or it could have been as rigid as the caste system in India with the lowest level being something like an 'Untouchable' where any kind of atrocity could be visited upon them and no one would care. In fact it would be reinforced by the belief that they had somehow done this to themselves or their ancestors had committed a crime of such magnitude that it warranted them to be cast down out of true civilization. It could have been any degree of both.

You have to remember that every one Transformers is a battle ready war machine, capable of changing appearances. It's like a society made up of Alex Mercer's. Also, I doubt they have anything in the way of currency or economics, since all they need is Energon and Metal (mining, engineering... that's about it).

I can see only, the rule of the strongest (Despotism) and small currency-free economy dictated by them, or, since everyone can kick ass, class-less equality (Communism) and small currency-free economy dictated by the popular vote.

Mythandariel wrote:

Now don't get me wrong. There is no humanoid methods of reproduction. The activity may be pleasurable, however there are no screaming O-faces or humping like rabbits. It is pleasant in the way that a good deep tissue massage is pleasant.

It involves a cable that extends from one spark chamber to a device just below a femmes spark chamber. The two, having a mix of both Primus and Unicron in their personalities would be able to create a third being that is a random mix of both of their personalities. Though anything beyond that is based on the created being's talents and wants. The task complete, the new being would be allowed to stabilize and mature inside the femmes body until such a time as it can sustain itself in it's own shell. That is it.

They are robots. They have to be built manually. Stop trying to parallel human and transformer physiology.

Mythandariel wrote:

Now, since the secret of the Transformers is out, there would be those who would identify with one side or the other. There would be many Decepticon sympathizers as well as Autobot sympathizers. The choice would be intensely personal.

That doesn't work. Humanity didn't initiate dick in this war. The Decepticons came in and started ruining our shit for... no apparent reason and Autobots came in and helped us. I am willing to admit that I am wrong, but you will have to point out to me the existence of a large group of anti-American Nazi sympathizers in France or Britain circa 1940's. (Bonus points for them being located in London)

Mythandariel wrote:

I would imagine that there would be no magical unification of all peoples under one banner in an effort to defeat Unicron and the Decepticons. I imagine it would throw much of the world into civil war. I am imagining a conflict on an epically grand scale.

Maybe. But not for the reasons you think. It's more of a political disaster behind keeping an extra-terrestrial in your closet. Or a religious movement(worshiping
Primus or Unicron) taking over a country and going to war with those who oppose them.

There are some things I agree which I have thought about myself and some things I'm uncomfortable with. Let's start with the ideas I agree.

Transformers social structure: If you were familiar with the comics, you would know that there's loads of evidence of them having social classes. In G1 comics Megatron accidentally gets himself wandering aimlessly with his circuits broken in Autobot slums for example. Also in the newer comics(Megatron origins) there's hard evidence that Transformers actually have social classes(Gladiator fights where all the poor and/or outcast bots are thrown).

Also some hard evidence of having social classes is Mirage. He's constantly said to be a high class bot and often despised because of that. He's even said to have had a huge estate in somewhere in Cybertron(Praxus? Not sure though and I'm not arsed to check).

In the Real action movie comics they show a division between military lead by Megatron and worker robots lead by Optimus. When the war brokes out(Megatron goes crazy after starting to worship the Fallen) most of the workers become Autobots and most of the soldiers become Decepticons(Ironhide becomes an Autobot despite of being a soldier). There isn't enough canon to show if it's the same in the Bayverse, but assuming from all the other evidence I would say they have social structure very similar to ours.

I'm kind of uncomfortable with your idea of reproduction of Transformers though. I do believe that they reproduce on their own - There's much evidence on the canon for that. For an easy example: We are shown robot children during the G1 movie and therefore I would I assume they exist. There's also another occasion in the comics where we are shown obviously teenaged robots.

I'm so going to fuck up with the terms now and I know it. Please try to bear with me.

First of all I like to think that the Transformers really don't have genders or sexes(there's even canonical evidence for this: Spotlight Arcee). I really don't see any purpose for them having genders - Things living in Earth have genes and chromosomes that's why they have genders and sexes. They need to have genitals for transfering them forward to the net generation that is their offsprings. Now here we are with giant robots that are made of metal and the thing keeping them alive is spark.

Spark is the soul of a Transformer. You can put the spark into any kind of shell and still the Transformer stays alive(and yes there's canonical evidence for this too (First thing coming into my mind is from Unicron trilogy). Fembots as we call them just simply happen to have an appearance that looks feminine to us. Also if you are familiar with a fembot called Chromia, you would know she kicks ass as much as any other bot without unnecessary typically female associated emotions.

Now when we have cleared that let's start talking about reproduction of TFs, shall we? That said I don't believe in TFs having genders or sexes, I believe they should be equal in the process. This is where my favourite way of having TF's produce comes in: Spark merging. They merge sparks resulting a new spark which contains data from both of the creators.

The new spark might need to get stronger before it could be put in a "body", but I haven't given it so much of thought. There (obviously) isn't canonical evidence how the reproduction actually happens(minus some ways that I discuss later), but there is canonical evidence for spark bonding though(G1 comics) and for all the spark bond stuff you see going around the fandom. The fanbrats didn't come up with it themselves.

Then some other ways to reproduce: Vector Sigma - Again G1 cartoon(and comic) showed how adult Transformers were created. Build a body for adult TF and take them to Vector Sigma for sparks. Apparently they need lots of programming in this way.

Dinobots in G1 cartoon(in the comics they had been buried in a swamp, since prehistoric time and Ratchet found them) Ratchet and Wheeljack create them. I have no idea how they get them sparks, but maybe it would explain why Grimlock is so simple.

Now the subject of Primus and Unicron. There actually is canonical evidence for Unicron creating life, which you won't like because I'm talking about Mini-Cons. Mini-Cons were created by Unicron, sooo there's a possibility for that. But I would believe it happened in the same way as with Mini-Cons creating a new faction - Not creating something with Primus. Remember Unicron hates Primus and the matrix.

Also why not Transforming Primus and Unicron both of them Transform in the canon?

Okay this was my two cents on the subject otherwise you are good to go in my opinion.

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Sorsa A. Jänis wrote:

I like to think that the Transformers really don't have genders or sexes(there's even canonical evidence for this: Spotlight Arcee). I really don't see any purpose for them having genders

Maybe not, but they do have genders. If there's an iteration of Transformers where they refer to each other as "it" and never use male or female pronouns, let me know.

If you go by the origin story for Cybertron used in the G1 cartoon, there's a reason for Transformer genders: Cybertron was created by the Quintessons as a huge Transformer factory. They had domestic, servant robots and military robots, the prototypes/"ancestors" of the Autobots and Decepticons. If the Quintessons had two genders prior to becoming metal blobs on tentacles, and the same associated gender role bullshit we have, that explains why there are male and female Autobots, but only male Decepticons (at least in G1).

Of course the outside canon explanation is that this was a series originally aimed at boys and "male" is the "default" gender and rage rage but we'll leave that alone.

Cyberwulf wrote:

Sorsa A. Jänis wrote:

I like to think that the Transformers really don't have genders or sexes(there's even canonical evidence for this: Spotlight Arcee). I really don't see any purpose for them having genders

Maybe not, but they do have genders. If there's an iteration of Transformers where they refer to each other as "it" and never use male or female pronouns, let me know.

If you go by the origin story for Cybertron used in the G1 cartoon, there's a reason for Transformer genders: Cybertron was created by the Quintessons as a huge Transformer factory. They had domestic, servant robots and military robots, the prototypes/"ancestors" of the Autobots and Decepticons. If the Quintessons had two genders prior to becoming metal blobs on tentacles, and the same associated gender role bullshit we have, that explains why there are male and female Autobots, but only male Decepticons (at least in G1).

Of course the outside canon explanation is that this was a series originally aimed at boys and "male" is the "default" gender and rage rage but we'll leave that alone.

Well we don't actually understand Cybertronian, so they are translated in English which has gender pronouns. If they were translated into Finnish there would be none gender pronouns.

My idea cleaned up...mostly

I still think it would be logical for Optimus to get Sam to put everything the All Spark downloaded into his mind onto some kind of visual medium for study.

Most of what the Autobots and Decepticons know about their origins are in what stories and legends they can remember. Most of what they know is spun to favor one faction over the other. Most remember what they experienced from their own point of view.

Mirage would remember a wonderful life until the Decepticons decided to take the warrior class and revolt against a system that he thought worked just fine.

Megatron would remember competing in the gladiatorial pits that were the last stop for social outcasts and the poorest of the poor before they met their maker so to speak. His memories will be much darker and filled with bitterness. The Fallen would have been the only bright spot in an otherwise bleak existence.

The histories would be something of a cold bucket of water for both sides since it is rarely as cut and dry as most would have it be. Anyway...the history of Cybertron would be a subplot at most. What it mentions before the rise of Cybertron is what would be of interest to Optimus.

It would make mention of the Quintessons but not much would be known about them except that they created two beings to oversee the creation of the race of servants that they depended upon. Those two beings were Primus and Unicron and they were tasked with imbuing the created servants with enough knowledge to fulfill their functions and nothing more.

Well these machines may have either been designed to be self aware, or may have become self aware over time and grew tired of having their creations used in such a manner and began to give their 'children' the ability to reason for themselves as they were able to.

This eventually led to the Quintessons downfall and the rise of Cybertronian society that was parallel of their functions. From lowest to highest; Outcast, Servant, Warrior, Laborer, Miner, Engineer, Science, Historian, Nobility, Council, Primes.

Social mobility was not prohibited but must have been extremely difficult. Optimus was a member of one of the working classes when he was appointed to Prime status. Mirage would have been part of the Nobility. Perceptor part of the Science class and Ironhide in the Warrior class.

Most of the Decepticons would have been the lowest of the low and identified with Megatron more readily than Optimus Prime who they would have felt was part of the problem.

Past aside, the entries on Primus and Unicron would interest Prime much more because he along with the other Autobots would remember different versions of legends that placed him as the Cybertronian creator and Unicron somewhere along the lines of a 'fallen god'.

It would come as a shock that the definition of 'good' and 'evil' is about as absolute as mist and the only thing that gives the definition any meaning is the being telling the story.

Anyway...

Perceptor would be working closely with NASA to spot any incoming Decepticons while masquerading as the HUBBLE space telescope. The OC that is his human liason would probably have something along the lines of a walk on role. She might be important later on. I am not sure yet.

Perceptor would observe the destruction of Betelgeuse and the odd way its energy is sucked into the largest planet that orbits the now dead star. This would alert the US military who would in turn alert the Autobots. Optimus, with this information along with the information contained in the All Spark on how to gather the energy from a dying star for Energon production would alert the military as to what they had seen.

The star going super nova would be no surprise, so the curiosity would be minimal. However it would let the humans know that as recently as 640 years ago, Transformers were harvesting energy from nearby stars since it would take the light of Betelgeuse's destruction 640 years to reach Earth. This would raise the question as to who had harvested the energy and whether they were friendly or not.

That is as far as I have gotten on the plot.

Okay this sounds better to me. I need to think about some things and I'll get back to the subject tomorrow, when I'm back from training.