There are theories – and it’s one of my theories – is that the Dark Energon warped and corrupted Megatron’s processor and possible some of his memory files. If nothing else the constant influence of Unicorn on him means he feels no connection to those he once had positive connection with and/or twists good/positive emotions into negative ones. And the still ‘sane’/’un corrupted’ part of his processor actively suppress some thing to protect those he really doesn’t want to hurt.
(I wish there was a clear list of what from the Cybertron Games TFP used other than the obvious.)
I think a good portion of it falls in the fact that most of Ratchet’s fighting falls more into the defensive motif, than the offensive. Megatron doesn’t immediately register Ratchet as a threat, possibly for two reasons.
Coding conditioning for all gladiator’s/caste systems could have possibly encoded a no-harm line in their CNA so that medical personnel would not be considered a threat, UNLESS that changes due to the medic attacking. At that point, it becomes self defense.
Or, he simply didn’t consider Ratchet an actual threat- being both healer, and older- he didn’t think he could put up that much of a fight.
And let’s face it- if he didn’t have the extra energon, and the synth-en, there’s a possibility that Megatron would have trounced him more than he did, even with as good a fight as he put up. Ratchet can defend himself damn well, he has to be able to. Part of taking care of your triage on the ground is making sure they stay alive through the battle.
And yourself along with it.
But when Ratchet went offensive, Megatron probably saw him as the threat he could be- and as thus, treated him as a threat- like he would Prime, or Arcee, or Bumblebee. Ratchet’s marker shifted.
And Ratchet got his ass handed to him.
Which is why, after that– if you notice, Ratchet seemed to gain a lot more injuries after that little fight.
Don’t get me wrong, Ratchet’s a hardcore old ambulance, and one hell of a medic- but in a fight? He can defend himself for a matter of time against Megatron, but in the end- the other mech’s skill and stamina would get him.
That would also explain why Knock Out gets away with a lot more failure and well everything without injury than say Starscream.
I think both your and mine mete/theory work good together – he calls his Optimus’ medic because any personal connection has been stripped/suppressed and the not considering a threat/etc from what you said.
I want to see the Op/Ratch costume so badly. Megatron delights in overly dramatic speeches about hope and goodness while SW is replaying sound bites he’s recorded of Ratchet over the years
YES!
And half the soundbites are, “I needed that!” with Soundwave miming throwing his hands up despairingly.
Megatron enjoys turning even the most innocuous moments into Optimus catchphrases. Like he’s getting them drinks, and instead of just ordering, he strikes a pose and declaims, “One shall have an engex neat, and one shall have a mercury toddy with a straw!”
I want to believe that Vos has a very eastern aesthetic. Bells, ribbons, flags and wind chimes being heavily utilized. Any things that moves and flutters in the breeze. Emphasising wind and air, two things seekers are very familiar with.
Towers would be decorated with tassels and ribbons during festivals and celebrations.
Dancing, flying, and singing are very admired in this culture. There are entire districts dedicated to expressing and perfecting the vosian aesthetic.
When it comes to music, i feel wood wind instruments, there were a variety of large and small drums, gongs, chimes, flutes, and stringed instruments, such as the imported mandolin-like biwa, the flat six-stringed zither, and/or the thirteen stringed koto. Drums would be used to represent sonic booms created by jets surpassing the sound barrier. Their music could be light and airy or thunderous and loud.
Most seekers are painted to standout in the crowd but not to be garish. They follow color theory and tend to choose complementary colors.
Depending on the circumstance, Picking a new paint could be a casual affair or a political statement.
For their military personnel, they are painted with camouflage in mind. A light underbelly and a dark top, they would be difficult to see from above and below. Certain colors were only allowed to be used by active service members such as red accents and yellow for the Sky Lord.
When it comes to Vos’ overall architecture and design it’s very similar to Art Nouveau, very decorative and filled with curved and twisted motifs that mimic the movements of an aircraft in flight.
But less gold. It’s more Silver.
Expects skylights and colored glass to be prevalent. Fliers do like to have an unbroken visual of the sky. And lots of colors.
Where Megatron was made into Galvatron. To contrast them: one is calm and calculating; one is crazy and emotional. (It’s mostly non-pairing but a bit OPM if you squint.)
The story:
The main character is Sari. It begins with Sari’s abduction from college. The Decepticons thought Megatron was dead, and the loyalists discovered that Sari carried Megatron’s CNA (Black Arachnia discovered this), and thus, a rightful heir to the empire. Lugnut went and abducted her to New Koan. She refused to be their leader, of course.
(Actually Megatron was not dead but tricked by Unicron who was sealed in Dead Universe and remade into Galvatron to be its agent and slave.)
But she got to see the Decepticons as a people. She also discovered that the general Decepticons didn’t particularly squirm around organics like the general Autobots did. They even had a few organic planets. (Although the locals were not treated nicely, but not as bad as if they were some bugs to be squished.) and they traded with nearby organic entities.
When Galvatron returned, she was confirmed once again to carry his CNA. She cried hiding in her room, but in the end decided, biological or not, it doesn’t matter. She was only Sumdac’s daughter. (Later though she began to respect Megatron more and although still won’t call him father, she admitted she wasn’t ashamed to be biologically linked to the warlord anymore.)
Optimus, Bumblebee, Bulkhead and Ratchet didn’t find out until much later, due to intentional omission of information and political manipulations.
Galvatron would be more often than not in a mentally degenerated state, striking out at his own army. But he never really hurt Sari. He also sometimes seemed to return to himself briefly, and have a short conversation with her. They developed a kind of mutual respect, and Sari admitted to herself, they were kind of alike. Both were stubborn, rebellious, intelligent and ferocious, both carried a passion to protect their own people.
One day, Megatron noted their analogy to earth’s Greek mythology, that Athena was eventually to replace Zeus, like their own fates. Sari declared she would never be the lord of Decepticons. Megatron just quirked his lips, and said “we shall see.”
Eventually team Optimus came to rescue Sari, stealing Omega Supreme and escaping Cybertron’s air control (promptly announced as traitors by Sentinel Magnus), but discovered that Galvatron was building something sinister, a mystical machine. They tried to stop him. At this juncture Galvatron/Megatron has regained some control and tried to sabotage Unicron’s plan by letting them do just that. Unicron, enraged by his slave’s disobedience, punished him and completely took over his body.
Still, before the final battle, Megatron managed to resurface, disclosed Unicron’s plan to return by destroying Cybertron, and asked Sari to promise him to look after his Decepticons. Discovering she couldn’t deny him this last wish, Sari promised she would look after them, in tears. She knew Megatron well now, and knew that Megatron would rather die than totally destroy his home world Cybertron or be used as a mad puppet by Unicron.
Galvatron led the confrontation to a remote Galaxy so as not to destroy the machine. Optimus temperately defeated Gavatron, but refrained from the final blow. (He knew Gavatron was not acting on his own will.)
“Again?” Megatron, returning to himself, asked.
In his rare moments of clarity and calmness, Megatron asked Optimus(who once claimed he didn’t deserve death), if that is what Optimus wanted, Megatron broken. Optimus was too stricken to say much, but he forcefully denied. (“I am broken. Optimus. ” Megatron, looking at him from the surface of the planetoid he crashed on, calmly asked. “The Mighty Megatron, sanity in pieces. Is this what you wanted?” Optimus was stricken, not only by this unusual disclosure of vulnerability, but also the pang of guilt/regret he felt, that his words was perceived twisted like this, although wasn’t that what they literally meant? He couldn’t deny that he meant to harm Megatron, but not like this. Never like this. )
Then, Megatron, tired, closed his eyes and demanded again for Optimus to finish him. The job had he done right several years ago, there wouldn’t have been so much fuss. Optimus refused and tried to rescue him. But eventually the Decepticon leader shut himself down into stasis lock. (Because he was proud and couldn’t stand to be crazy. Also to prevent Unicron from using him again and to save his home planet.) With the agent inactive, they managed to prevent Unicron from coming out of Dead Universe, where it belonged.
Sari, the new lord of Decepticons, with annoyance, exasperation and a resigned fondness towards her turbulent “subjects,” began to form a new era.
Bumblebee decided to stay with Sari. He couldn’t return to Cybertron anyway. Bulkhead stayed too. Later Sari would enlist his help to build a spacebridge to earth as the first order of her throne. Optimus and the others didn’t endorse Sari’s decision. But they tried to understand it. However, didn’t want to return a comatose Decepticon ex-leader who was also the only passage to Unicron to Sentinel, who would undoubtedly order unethical experiment on him and possibly destroy the universe in doing so, Optimus, Ratchet and Omega Supreme sailed away into the galaxies with Galvatron/Megatron, not before promising Sari to try to find a cure for him.
——————–
The machine: would open a portal to the dead universe for Unicron to return using the energy derived from destruction of a planet. Unicron initially intended to use Cybertron but when the battle began he was desperate enough to want to use New Koan.
Explanation about Megatron’s fate: they couldn’t just wake him up because that would let Unicron get control. The doctor discovered a portal in him, attaching to his processor, but had no clue how it worked or how to safely remove it. Someone suggested just killing him and burning him down, but it was too unethical and dangerous, and was dismissed right away. They also didn’t want to give him back to Decepticons mainly because a portal to Unicron would be too dangerous fallen to the wrong hands. So they had to keep him in stasis lock and get away. Sari wanted to keep Megatron on New Koan but knew her status was not stable enough to guarantee enough safety.
I want to believe that Vos has a very eastern aesthetic. Bells, ribbons, flags and wind chimes being heavily utilized. Any things that moves and flutters in the breeze. Emphasising wind and air, two things seekers are very familiar with.
Towers would be decorated with tassels and ribbons during festivals and celebrations.
Dancing, flying, and singing are very admired in this culture. There are entire districts dedicated to expressing and perfecting the vosian aesthetic.
When it comes to music, i feel wood wind instruments, there were a variety of large and small drums, gongs, chimes, flutes, and stringed instruments, such as the imported mandolin-like biwa, the flat six-stringed zither, and/or the thirteen stringed koto. Drums would be used to represent sonic booms created by jets surpassing the sound barrier. Their music could be light and airy or thunderous and loud.
Most seekers are painted to standout in the crowd but not to be garish. They follow color theory and tend to choose complementary colors.
Depending on the circumstance, Picking a new paint could be a casual affair or a political statement.
For their military personnel, they are painted with camouflage in mind. A light underbelly and a dark top, they would be difficult to see from above and below. Certain colors were only allowed to be used by active service members such as red accents and yellow for the Sky Lord.
And then I took it way too far lmao (Bulkhead facilitates Starscream’s redemption arc):
So there’s a firefight between the deceps and the autos, Starscream gets injured so his legs are out of commission. Megatron and his generals are defeated and retreat, leaving Starscream behind.
Bulkhead, being the caring bot he is, insists that they can’t just leave him there. After a bit of negotiation which involves disabling Starscream’s guns and flight capability, Bulk convinces them to let him bring Scream back to hq.
Optimus is really on the fence about bringing Starscream back to hq, but after negotiating he reluctantly lets it happen. Prowl is absolutely not here for this but he warms up to maybe even room temperature after a while. Bumblebee thinks it’s cool that they’ve captured a decepticon, and would pick on him if he wasn’t so scary, even without guns, wings, and legs. Ratchet tries to be mean but gets very soft about him cause he’s just a kid.
Starscream wants nothing to do with the autos and the only reason he goes with them is he was literally carried. For a short while, he threatens that Megatron will come to get him, at which time the autobots will be in big trouble. But Megatron doesn’t come. After that Starscream realizes he’ll have to get out himself so he plans to step 1) gain the autobots trust, step 2) betray them, step 3) ???? and step 4) rule cybertron. Ruling cybertron sounds better than just ruling the decepticons right? (Subconsciously he’s already becoming woke)
While staying with the autobots he starts to realize a lot of things, like the deceps never cared about him and even made him into something he realizes he doesn’t want to be, but even though he’s a decepticon these autobots are treating him with respect and care? Hes entirely conflicted because decepticon ideals are all he knows, they are truth, they are law. Then why do they all seem inaccurate all of a sudden?
As days pass he starts losing the desire to betray the autobots and starts becoming even friends with both Bulkhead and Bumblebee (being their same age). He gets love and affection and validation from the autobots and learns who he is as a person and eventually entirely deserts the decepticon cause.
This one’s trickier because Unicronians are largely a myth, to Cybertronians. Unicron is a spooky boogeyman who couldn’t have possible existed, right? R-right?
But Primus! Primus is the ground upon which they walk, the wellspring from which all life comes! Primus is the sparks of those who have been, and those who are yet to come. Primus is the intelligence deep at the core of Cybertron. Sometimes it still ‘talks’ to it’s children. Primus is viscerally real to Cybertronians, as opposed to Unicron, and thus…all cybertronians are considered to be, in some respect, the avatars of Primus.
An ideal Cybertronian would do as a proper avatar. They are brightly-colored with shiny metallic portions, their paint fresh and flawless, their optics and biolights bright and reactive. Their EM fields open and unshielded, welcoming.
And then we have Primes.
Primes are the living angels of Primus- Matrices are powerful and their wielders often more powerful than they ever know, or have the capability to unlock. The original 13 were equal parts physical and energy being in truth, and had abilities that would be considered downright magical or inexplicable by most- in fact, many of their abilities are assumed to be exaggeration, or the result of histories being written with a strong bias.
Primes may appear completely typical outwardly, but their EM fields may be unusually ‘loud’ to others around them- and when excess energy is being used the nanites that suffuse Cybertron’s atmosphere may alight around them, framing them in structures of light- halos, texts, a sort of living, surrounding shield of displays. This usually cues in a cybertronian as to the unworldly nature of something like a Prime, or something equally powerful.
imagin a Transformers animated based puzzles/ stealth horror game in with you make character and investigate an “abandoned” Decepticon lab under Cybertron.
The basic plot would be that resent energy has been pick up in a long abandoned Decepticon lab that appears dangerous and your character is sent to investigate but upon entering you find that it’s sole purpose was to make sparkeater’s for the war, only none seem to be there.
In it you can choose a class to be in and each would have it’s straights and weakest, as well as give slightly different stories.
As an intell-bot, you get advantage on investigation and have more knowledge going into the lab then others, but you are not a fighter and have little defense or strength and have average stealth. The reason your there is you where sent by the ultra Magnus.
As a soldier/fighter, you of course have better self defense than the others as well as having better survival skills and have experience in Long rage fighting. But you are weaker in the intelligence and your stealth is below average and can only hide in certain places. You would be sent there to after the disappearance of an Intelligence agent.
As a cyber ninja you are better at sealth and survival the others and have average strength and intelligence as well as experience in close range weapons. But are weaker in puzzles solving and navigating. You are there for almost the same reason as the fighter.
As a repair bot you have an average in most things but are better at puzzles solving and fixing you can use both short and close range weapons. You are there on your own will after your friend went there on a mission and didn’t come back.
But all the classes have a fear bar as well as health and if the fear meter runs out you run away getting farther from the objective and depending on your class it’s higher or lower.
As a bonus you can have life lines for puzzles if you get stuck in the form of cannon characters and depending on your class, intells get Proceptor or Blurr, Fighters get Rodimus or kup, ninja bots get Springer or Dirft but as for the repair bot they get none do to not have any one on the inside and end up in which a date pad that is running low on power. Who you get on the line depends on the hardnes of the problem.
As well as a multi-player where you can each get a class and must work together to solve puzzles.
As much as I like the trope of Ex-Decepticons making stuff up to scare their Autobot/Neutral friends I think I like “Ex-Decepticon tells 100% true stories that their friends think are fake until they find out for themselves that it’s real” better
Cybertronian Database 