mirax00

[mirax00]

A Summary Of The Transformers Franchise

Generation One Cartoon: A four season long shitpost. Really wants you to buy some toys.

Transformers The Movie: All My Friends Are Dead The Movie. Featuring a musical score by somebody with a serious hard-on for hair metal.

Marvel Comic: A grand cosmic adventure spanning thousands of years and tackling themes of morality and faith, interspersed with the goofiest shit imaginable.

Headmasters: Only notable for the terrible dub. Fortress Maximus has come himself.

Masterforce: Things go off the rails. Wishes it was a Gundam show.

Victory: Things go back to normal. Starring BURNING JUSTICE. Probably the best of the animes.

Zone: A yaoi anime posing as Transformers. An utter enigma. Probably would’ve been hilarious if it got past the first episode.

Generation Two: The one everybody forgets. Contains dangerous amounts of 80’s and terrible rap music.

Beast Wars: The Transformers become furries in order to survive in the time of cavemen. Somehow manages to be awesome despite a bizarre premise.

Beast Machines: Also known as “Why You Don’t Fix Things That Aren’t Broken”.

Robots In Disguise: That guy at work who you don’t hate, but you don’t exactly like him either. Starring a shark that does poetry.

Eugenesis: A Quintesson invasion forces the Transformers to face their most terrifying threat yet; Mpreg. Is practically canon despite being a fan fic because it’s just that awesome.

Transformers Universe: Unicron abducts Transformers from across the multiverse in an epic clash, but you won’t see that because of bankruptcy. Meanwhile the writers go on an epic yet obsessive quest to undo Beast Machines.

Armada: A wacky scavenger hunt for Pokémon leads to the deaths of hundreds. Everybody keeps forgetting everybody else’s names for some reason.

Energon: The screw-up the rest of the family hates. You expected nothing and you were still disappointed. Has weirdly good music.

Cybertron: Unexpectedly good. Doesn’t get as much respect as it probably should.

Dreamwave Comics: Professionally published fan fiction. Everyone pretends they never liked it to save face. All the characters have the Ctrl-Alt-Delete face.

IDW Comics: Professionally published fan fiction, except it’s actually good this time. Won’t stop until every character is gay.

Transformers Timelines: Also known as “those sweet comics and toys you’ll never get because they were only at BotCon almost a decade ago”.

Transformers Collectors Club Magazine: Same as Timelines, only now it’s monthly magazine.

Kiss Players: The actual WORST. Embodies every horrible stereotype about Japanese media. You’ll probably get arrested if you read it in public.

Bayverse: The red-headed stepchild. Makes a ton of money but is so obnoxious everyone else ignores it.

Animated: Was too good for this sinful world. More anime than the actual animes. Inspires a lot of really weird fanfics.

Story Of Binaltech: Hirofumi Ichikawa tries to fix the nightmarish clusterfuck that is the Japanese Transformers continuity. Hope you like sports cars because that’s literally all anybody transforms into in this.

Ask Vector Prime: A grandpa from beyond space and time gets on Facebook to fix Transformers continuity, then gets pissed when everybody just asks him to give names to random background characters.

Transformers Prime: What Bayverse would’ve been if it was competently made. Dwayne Johnson is in the first episode for no readily apparent reason.

“For Cybertron” Games: The only video games in the franchise even worth mentioning. Gears Of War with robots.

Rescue Bots: Pure and innocent in every way.

Robots In Disguise: Has nothing to do with the first “RID”. Ostensibly a sequel to Prime, but feels like it didn’t really want to be one.

Transformers Devastation: Okay so there’s another game worth mentioning. The people who made Bayonetta bring their trademark anime-ass gameplay to Transformers.

Combiner Wars Cartoon: A total shitshow.

Legends: Hayato Sakamoto tries to pick up where Ichikawa and Time Grandpa left off in fixing the continuity and just creates a bigger mess. The pack-in comics are pretty cool nonetheless.

Beast Wars Uprising: Cybertron finally gets an export of “The Hunger Games”, leading to a violent revolution that kills millions. For some reason all the stories are named after Tumblr social justice terms.

Transformers Cyberverse: Windblade babysits Bumblebee and gets into wacky hijinks after the horrific collapse of society. Also Soundwave dances at the club.

Rescue Bots Academy: It’s literally just Rescue Bots but even more aggressively cute and innocent.

Bumblebee: According to all known laws of filmmaking, it didn’t seem possible to make a good live-action Transformers movie. Travis Knight, of course, made one anyway, because Travis Knight does not care what humans think is impossible.

[mirax00]

Is he speaking about me?

Btw, this is one of the best One Piece panels.

[mirax00]

The Pursuit

A long while ago, I believe in March, @transformers-spike dearest asked me for a predator/prey Tarn x reader. So here we go. I've been keeping this safe in the warehouse for a while, as I wanted to add a part two as well, but I figured I could just post this and worry about the part two later.

Reader uses she/her pronouns.

“She likes you, you know?”

Tarn looks away from the datapad and shifts his attention to the smaller femme next to him, all intent on reading a series of medical records. Nickel doesn’t bother to look at him, and that irritates him. She knows. She always does that on purpose. 

“How can you tell?”

Of course, he already knows what she’s talking about. 

He feels a quiet discomfort surging in the depths of his spark. Every time this particular topic is mentioned, he’s on edge, teeth clenching on nothing behind the mask, claws shifting against one another.

He doesn’t want to think about it. Doesn’t want to think about you. 

Yet, he finds himself indulging Nickel once again.

Weakness.

“The periodical check-ups you’ve requested,” she resumes, “I’ve had the chance to study human medical texts and find out how our little pet works. It’s fascinating, truly." 

She sets the datapad aside, smiling as something more akin to a smirk shapes the corners of her lips. She wants to get somewhere, and Tarn makes a mental note to steady himself for any incoming attacks. 

“Much like nanities swarming our fuel lines, humans work through extracellular signaling. They have nanities of their own, cytokines, hormones, neurotransmitters. Take a look,”

She presses a button on his datapad and soon enough the excerpts of her research replace the intel report he was reading. Intrigued, albeit still on edge, he begins to read. 

“Serotonin values. They’ve been relatively stable after she’s gotten used to life onboard. They used to be much lower than that, especially at the beginning. Remember when her values were so low and I couldn’t pinpoint exactly what the cause was? Well, it seems like humans are controlled by their mood almost as much as your fellow cybertronian is." 

“I suggest you make yourself clearer than that, and not entertain your ego." 

“Alright, alright. Serotonin is a mood stabilizer. Its levels are supposed to be around… here. This is the threshold,” she points at something on the datapad. “Lower than this, and our dear human becomes depressed. Higher than this, and she begins experiencing manic episodes." 

“You’re still striving further from your original point.” he cuts in. He’s annoyed, and impatient as always when the topic of the human aboard the Peaceful Tyranny is introduced. He wants to end this conversation as soon as possible, so he can concentrate on something more befitting of a Decepticon. Not on an insignificant human.

“I can’t make you understand if you don’t let me introduce the topic properly-” 

“I believe you were granted enough time to explain yourself."

“Wrong! This was a mere example, now, allow me to put the two things together, sir." 

A low growl escapes him, but he doesn’t change the image on the datapad. The curiosity is eating him alive, and he loathes it. Luckily for him, Nickel takes the hint without the need to embarrass him further. 

“So, the serotonin thing works for mood control, but of course there are many other control points for many other physiological functions, namely hormones. Here’s where I want you to listen.”

She points at another series of values, which the datapad shows to have been shifting with a more-or-less progressive ratio over a series of joors. 

“Hormones control a series of things, like feeding behaviors, aggressiveness, or the human recharge cycle. Now, there are these two hormones right here,” she taps her finger onto the datapad, “estrogen and progesterone, they are particularly fascinating.”

His optics narrow. 

“They’re sexual hormones. In other words, they are produced in higher amounts when our human is aroused, to make her prone to interfacing."

Debauchery.

“Where in the Pit are you going with this?” he scoffs, and closes the page. 

Enough teasing. He won’t stand for this blasphemous talk. He has no business mingling with an inferior species’ interface behaviors.

“No, no! Listen to me, here’s where it gets interesting. See, she produces these hormones especially when you’re around."

“What in Megatron’s-”, no, he shall not sully His name in this perverse conversation. 

He stands on his pedes, prompting Nickel to fall back. He grabs her by one antenna, tugs it upward - not enough to break it off, but enough to declare his patience has run thin.

“You better hurry back to your duties, medic. I have urgent matters to attend to." 

So he releases his grip, leaving the offended femme to readjust her crooked antenna. Still, the smirk remains on her somatic panels. 

“I’ll go, sir,” oh how he despises that condescending tone of hers. “But before that, I have a request for you. One I think you’ll enjoy." 

He crosses his arms, and taps his claws in a slow pattern.

“Speak."

“I have studied much of the human’s physiological responses, but, you see, you’ve only ordered me to monitor her after she got used to being around us. What I haven’t been able to record, is precisely what you always accuse her species of being."

His tapping stops. “They are nothing but pathetic, inferior, scurrying scraplets dominated by fear. It’s not an accusation, it’s the truth."

“Here’s where I want you."

“Pardon?”

“Fear. I haven’t been able to record her fear response. Well, yes, in some aspects, but I still don’t possess the recording of her terror response being put into action. I need you to push her to the limit, drive out her most visceral fear.”

There’s a glint in her optics, one Tarn can’t seem to decipher. “All without pushing her past the breaking point, just enough to draw a detailed report on how her organic processor works in the midst of danger. And you’re the best suited for the job.”

He raises a brow behind the mask. 

Ever since joining the Decepticons, his life-cycle has revolved around striking fear into his opponents. What he has become, all the pain he has inflicted, all was aimed to please his Lord and bring forth the Cause. The terrified screams he’s drawn out of those he was tasked to destroy, the minds he has torn apart and the frames he has dissected piece by piece, all have brought him nothing but honor and delight. Scaring a little human? Nothing more than sparkling’s play. And maybe, just maybe, this may settle a personal score in the depths of his spark.  

“Are any particular conditions required?” oh, he’s amused now.

“Try to re-enact a capture. An all-or-nothing scenario.”

He’d said you were needed for a simulation. 

“Pursuit. Mass-displaced autobots are harder to locate, hunt down and capture,” he had clenched his fist at that, and something in the pit of your stomach had done a somersault. 

“For this reason, I need your participation in the training.” 

“What do you need me to do?” you had asked readily. Little naive thing, always compliant.

“Run from me. Hide and escape. Try to defy me in any way you can,” his gaze had softened then — you wonder if he had realized that. 

“Even if you won’t succeed.”

You’re in the middle of their training field. Immense, you wonder how that much open space could fit on a ship alone. Then, you remember that said ship is inhabited by alien monsters ten times or more your size, much more resourceful and advanced than your species could ever dream to be. 

“Simulation on, commence field shaping,” a pre-recorded voice announces and the scenery changes all around you. You’re surrounded by ruins, metal blades and arches, infrastructure barely holding together. Cybertron after the fall. 

Tarn’s voice cuts through the cold air and whispers into you, rumbling, coaxing. Eerie in the way its low, smooth cadence travels across your nerve fibers like petroleum on a wire, stirring your senses.

The air prickles your lungs. 

“Steady yourself. I’ll begin pursuing soon.”

You let out a shaky breath and dare not look back. Behind you, he’s transforming in a frenzy of clanks and clicks and the noise is still too alien for comfort.

Somewhere behind the safety glass, Nickel begins to record your rising cortisol levels. 

“Vent in,” you hear him purr. Of course, you obey.

No one can hear him but you. You don’t respond to his voice because he commands you to, but your body complies on its own. 

“Good, vent out.” – again, you do as commanded – “Eyes on the field. Find a hiding spot. Make sure I can’t see you.” 

The turret rotates and you know he’s looking away, giving you the advantage you need in your race for survival — not to best him, you could never, but this is a little game the two of you can play. Prolong your turmoil and anxiety. So the fear will be much sweeter. 

Your feet move on their own as you scramble to find a spot that he might overlook. You hope your steps aren’t too loud. You don’t dare run, not yet, but the sound of you treading the debris on the ground is giving you away and you can already hear the turret turning back. 

Then he stops. You hear him chuckle. 

“Do you need more time?”

“I-I-” “An autobot doesn’t engage in conversation with its enemy.”

You bite back a curse and scuttle away from his gaze and from his voice echoing around you. He’s playing with you, and you begin to wonder if he really needed you to help him train or if this was just a plan to humiliate you.

You look around, past the ruins and you marvel at how real the metal feels when you touch a pillar and it leaves your palm stained with rust. You can breathe in the decay and the despair it bears, and the danger coming right behind you. 

A whisper.

“Hide, human.”

Something inside you shifts and your breath stalls in the back of your throat. You look right and left, watching your surroundings with an atavic urgency that speaks from the depths of your instincts. Something that feels like fear. 

Your legs tremble as you settle for a hidden spot behind a half-crumbled wall. You don’t dare move as you hear him begin to hum. 

You wonder if he hums when he stalks others too, if he sings while he kills. 

“I’ll begin your search now. If you’re not well-hidden, I’ll be very disappointed.”

His heavy trudging begins, the chains pulverizing debris on his path and a primal fear of crushing seizes you as you picture yourself caught under them. Bile rises up your esophagus, you can taste the acid amidst the cold and the underlying stench of ozone. 

You try not to think about it, say that this is just a game, but you don’t feel so sure as your fingers clamp down on your forearm to ensure that your bones are still intact. Your skin is as cold as a corpse. 

His hunt continues. He’s almost past the pillar you’ve touched when one of the cannons targets the handprint you’ve left. 

He stops. Everything stills.

Then, a shot. 

The pillar explodes in a million pieces and so does another wall right past your hiding spot. You bite back a cry and freeze as you hear the cannon reload. His merciful courtesy willed that the shot be silenced, else your eardrums would have already burst.

The recording registers a spike in adrenaline and noradrenaline release, a surge that isn’t quite what Nickel is looking for. 

But Tarn doesn’t know. 

The quick thumps of your heart inside your ribcage and in your ears are all you hear after the dust settles. Tarn doesn’t speak. A silent rebuke for having left your trace on an open path. 

There are shards near your feet, your hands closed in a vice grip onto your mouth lest any noise comes out of it. Your whole body keeps shaking. 

He wouldn’t kill you. Would he? You don’t know, you don’t think– you can’t think. You only know he can. He’s silent now and he’s a tank ready to shoot to drive you out. Maybe he won’t care if he shoots too close.

Maybe he wants to. 

You swallow the bile back and find your mouth cold and dry. 

The trudging becomes louder and you squeeze your eyes shut. You hope the sound of your heartbeat won’t alert him to your presence. He’s close. He’s right behind-

Another shot and this time half of the wall beside you comes crashing down. 

You scream — idiot! Now he knows where you are! — and scramble out of your hiding spot, looking back just to find all four of his cannons pointed right at you. 

Another big mistake — He’ll kill you now. 

Don't look back. 

But your feet take you farther despite his engines flaring up, your lungs filling with dust as you keep running. There are tears running down your face and shards piercing past your shoes and still you run. Flee. There’s nothing left if not to flee. You don’t feel the burn inside your lungs. You don’t feel the oxygen begin to lack. You run, and this time you don’t look back.

Behind you, Tarn is amused. Disappointed? Not really, he never held that much hope you’d be able to elude him to begin with. This is only a game. You hide, and he seeks. Sparkling’s play.

But there’s something alluring in the way you don’t admit defeat. You don’t fall down even as the wall you were hiding behind crumbles down completely. 

He continues his path. 

He shoots a little above your head and you stumble and fall as you cover your ears. He thinks you’ll stay there, but instead you’re back on your feet and running still. Fierce. 

And something in his spark stirs. 

He is speeding up behind you and you can’t see or think straight. Nothing if not running, nothing if not survival. The terror so ancient it empties you of anything but fear. 

Fear and something else. Something else that is equally primal. Something you can’t name, seeping slowly through your veins.

His cannons retreat and he’s speeding more, pushing you past the limits of your body. Knows your muscles will be sore soon enough and still he can’t bother to care. He wants it. The chase. There’s something alluring in the way your body is wired for escape, for defiance. 

This is not what it was all supposed to be about. The game was meant to show your inferiority. The power imbalance. That you were made to be chased, to be hunted down. You were supposed to surrender.

Instead, you keep running. And maybe it’s the stark contrast between your puny frame and your will to survive that makes you look almost worthy. 

This doesn’t feel like a game anymore. Maybe he simply shouldn’t be feeling a thrill so visceral as he never did when hunting down autobots. Maybe when he catches you you’ll submit, yield to his superior strength and prowess. Maybe you’ll recognize you’re made for these roles. The hunter and the hunted. And you’ll beg him to end you right there. Or maybe you’ll fight more and only submit when he’ll have shown you your place. 

He’s right behind you and you let out a strangled cry when you feel his chains brush your calf, close enough to drag you down and crush your limbs. 

Then he transforms, and instead of cannons and chains there’s an arm seizing you and sending you tumbling into the ground, but you don’t cry out as you roll down surrounded by metal. 

You open your eyes, breath quick and uneven as you stare up at Tarn, mass-displaced, caging you between the ground and himself. And there are tears rolling down your cheeks, chest rising and falling in quick breaths as your nails scrape the metal of his forearms. 

A whine, mouthing for something you can’t exactly pinpoint. And underneath him, that something that is primal and scary surges further as you stare into his optics and find a hunter. And you, the prey.

You should cry out. You should beg for mercy. Or just lie there and weep, devoured by terror. But the normal physiological response is lacking, and slowly but surely, that seeping feeling reaches the threshold.

He’s heaving, too, venting steady, hot whiffs distorting the air around his plating. He braces himself on his servos and knees and presses a claw to your neck. Soft. Pulsing. He could slice it open at any moment. You don’t notice, but he does, as your helm bends back slightly.

“You gave yourself away. Next time, see that you remain in control of your emotions.” he growls. His face is close enough for you to raise an arm and slither your hand beneath the mask — would there be fangs?

“Yes- yes…”, you mutter, yielding as he turns your face around so he can expose your neck and the arteries pulsing behind the delicate skin. 

And you don’t know why, but you want to pull him closer, urge him to take more. That he already took so much, he could take everything if so he wanted. 

Something forms in the pit of your stomach and travels down and before you know, fear is completely replaced by something else. 

You can’t dwell on it enough before he stands up. You let him hold you to himself as he mass-shifts back to his original size. A brief loss of balance and you’re sprawled on his palm, holding onto his index. 

“Have you collected sufficient data?” he asks Nickel as the two of you reach the end of the field and the simulation is replaced by plain scenery. 

“More than enough,” she grins. “You might want to take a look at this.”

You watch him stare at the datapad and his optics widen slightly, but you don’t dare ask what he sees. You’re still trying to collect yourself, and steady your breathing. You peek at the datapad and give up trying to understand what’s written. 

You have something else to ponder now. 

[mirax00]

Pharma scenario

This stupid thing came to me as I was applying gentamicin ointment

"Wait, so your name is Pharma?"

He scowls at you.

"I will assume your expression is one of curiosity and not disdain, but yes, that is my designation."

"And you're a doctor, correct?"

"Correct."

You take a few steps ahead, then turn your back on him abruptly, pacing back and forth while he looks at you with the fascination and mild disgust of a pet shop owner being entrusted with a venomous snake.

You turn to him again, your index up. "Don't mind if I ask, but did you acquire your name upon becoming a doctor or was it assigned to you at birth?"

He scoffs. "First, cybertronians aren't born, they are created; second, I did choose my designation according to my profession."

You make a sound of poorly-concealed condescence. Or at least, so it appears to his audial receptors.

He crosses his arms. "You think that's amusing? Oh do tell me, human, is your designation that much wittier?"

"Oh no, you got it wrong, I wasn't making fun of you. I just thought the situation was a bit... Peculiar."

"You haven't answered my question."

You smile at him, and also cross your arms.

"Pharma."

"I beg you pardon?"

"I'm also a doctor. Anesthesiologist to be exact."

"That's not funny."

At this point you do laugh, mostly at how serious his face remains despite the absurdity of it all.

"Okay, okay, my actual name is," you try to think of something clever, "Penicillin. Penny for short."

"Alright, Penicillin," something in the way you grin tells him you're still messing with him, "I'll do my best to relocate you to the nearest human colony." So that you'll leave him alone and stop annoying him.

"I appreciate it, Pharmacy."

"It's Pharma."

"Apologies, Psychopharmaceuticals."

He groans in exasperation.

[mirax00]

Hive for a Wolfpack

Prologue - The Crooked, the Cradle

Here comes the prologue of this monstrosity I'm making. It currently has 9-10 more chapters. It was originally meant to have like 6 but chapter 4 had to be split many times in order to make stuff viable. Primus knows how much I owe @revelboo for the inspiration she gave me for this thing. Please check out her stories, they're fire. And a big big thanks to @transformers-spike for motivating me and helping me out through it all.

In the natural order of things, a community is founded on cooperation and order among its members. To each, their unique strengths and the role that comes thereof. The strongest members protect the weak, provide the community with food and resources, allowing everyone to thrive. A community must desist from individualistic desires which only serve the self, creating internal turmoil which may prove fatal for the collectivity. Likewise, all members must strive towards a common goal, which ultimately consists in the wellbeing of the community itself. 

A community must, above all things, ensure coordination and harmony within its ranks through the election of the appropriate leadership. Said leadership is more often represented by an elected party or a singular individual which is distinguished through its exceptional moral and intellectual qualities and its total devotion to the community.

In the absence of said leadership, the community is bound to succumb to chaos, disorder and the prevalence of short-term individual desires. The community thus ceases existing, as its fundamental principle and lifeblood is compromised. Its former members disperse or engage in competition against one another for resources. The weakest, no longer protected and nurtured by community rule, perish. 

“Don’t you dare- dare! It’s mine to eat… eat!”, Shrapnel snarls as Bombshell drags the meat away and proceeds to gnaw on it. 

“And how exactly would you defend that statement, given that I was the one who scouted for the meal?”

And it was true. Bombshell had found the tent after the umpteenth hunt for the furry organics with side-facing optics had been inconclusive. There had been plenty upon their arrival, allowing for grand feasts. There had been peace. 

Then, either their gluttonous intakes had decimated the resident population, or the organics had learned to fear them and thus adapted for better concealment. Not escape. Never escape. Once they spotted an organic, it meant certain doom. 

Shrapnel hisses and transforms, pincers sharp and clicking aggressively. Bombshell follows and so does Shrapnel’s attack as the latter aims for the dents the Decepticon army managed to leave on Bombshell’s thick plating. 

They had been so close. And if the fraggers had actually managed to extinguish Bombshell’s spark, there would be one less intake to fill. 

Silent, Kickback slithers underneath the fighting pair, slips in a crumpled ball of green fabric and grabs the chunk of meat, gobbling it down before the other two can even realize the exchange. 

Shrapnel attempts a slicing move that sends Bombshell staggering backwards — mindful of the dents, and bites down on the meat. 

It’s stuffy and dry and the texture feels more like interwoven wires rather than the chewy mesh that characterizes organics. Bombshell, however, no longer seems willing to wrestle him over the food. Instead, he stares at Kickback as the latter retreats into a corner, chewing the stolen prize. 

“Look what we’ve become”, he turns back to Shrapnel. “Hiding, fighting each other for scraps. We’re turning into what we’ve always been accused of being”.

The other’s faceplates twist in disdain. “We’re only trying to survive, genius- genius.”

And that was also true. 

They had joined the Decepticons not with dreams of grandeur, but with the promise that somewhat, finally, they’d have a place to call their own. A hive to thrive in, a queen to guide them. A leader who’d recognize the prowess and superiority of their frame, and likewise free them of the stigma it brought along. 

None of that had happened. 

Bombshell’s claws rake the dull soil. He transforms back through a pattern of sharp clicks and shifts and Shrapnel does the same. 

It was a feat not many other cybertronians possessed, the ability to shift and retain their abilities in both forms — actually, he’d argue that their altmodes were even faster, stronger, more agile than their native frames. An edge that made them akin to predacons, alongside whom their ancestors roamed the rich lands of Cybertron before the age of civilization. An edge which, by the very nature of its perfection, had remained unchanged through time.

But Megatron was blind to their advantage, and all his talking about equality and the necessity to recognize the bot, not the frame, didn’t deter the chittering intakes and sharp glossas. Nor did Megatron stop them, the fragging hypocrite. No, he forced the insecticons under his rule and blatantly abused their trust. Bombshell grits his denta as he remembers feeling seen for the first time when he heard Megatron promising to shatter those heinous double-standards and lead them into a just world once and for all.

He had fought like a madmech to prove he was worthy of seeing that promise kept.

And what has all of that gotten him?

What has all that fighting and scrapping and then tolerating and keeping his claws tucked gotten him? 

What has it gotten all his brothers? 

Getting tossed like scrap by the leader they once admired.

That’s what it got ‘em.

A hive might reject a queen, but a queen shall never reject a hive. It was simply against nature, the very essence of natural order twisted into a pitiful imitation.

A community without a leader is marked for downfall. A hive without a queen is nothing. 

Without a queen, they were few, weakened, hungry and disorganized. They had already started biting at each other’s fuel lines. It wouldn’t be long until they offlined one another. 

And despite all this, they still needed to collaborate lest Megatron finalized their execution or the ball of mud they’re currently stranded on was depleted of food and available energy sources.

Kickback, as if sensing the turmoil underneath Bombshell’s plating, shifts closer with a coo and his wings flutter lightly behind him.

“Well, at least we have no Megatron treating us like foolish beasts, no more begging for energon and no submitting to those who look down upon us! We can survive, no, thrive better on our own. We are faster,” his mandibles click, “stronger, we are superior to each and every one of them! Even our dear leader”.

That word is hissed. 

“He promised to protect us”, Kickback continues, his silver tongue running. “But instead he enslaved us, forced us into submission, and decimated our ranks!”

“Unworthy- Unworthy!” Shrapnel rasps, sharp denta bared. He growls at Kickback and for a moment the smaller insecticon fears his brother’s poorly-concealed anger will turn into aggression. But Shrapnel just growls and clicks as he pushes against his bigger brother, hoping to stir him for another fight. 

It was the only way to keep the anger at bay. This, and hunting. 

But Shrapnel had never been as good a hunter as he was a fighter. 

“He abandoned us”, Bombshell declares with finality, not giving in to his brother’s provocation.

“We’ll make it, without them”, Kickback adds, and Shrapnel finally relents. 

Or at least, so it seems. But the big insecticon pounces on Kickback and the latter jumps back with a startled chirp. “Enough talking. I’m hungry, hungry”, he growls. “Go scout for food- food”. 

The jittering bot draws his antennae back. 

“We need recon, Kickback”, Bombshell adds.

And Kickback knows he has to make use of his greatest asset to appease his brothers’ hunger. His tanks churn. He needs fuel too.

Next>>

[mirax00]

Hey, remember that one time Inazuma Eleven showed a middle schooler snapping every muscle and bone from the head down with one of the most horrifying sounding effects followed by a haunting scream.

Shout out to Megumi Tano's voice acting, it actually sounded like someone went into the sound booth and broke her leg for that scream.

[mirax00]

Kōtei Penguin: The Ultimate Technique

Greetings my fellow readers =).

This is my first work on Tumblr. I'm also posting on AO3.

My goal is to write a treatise about the legendary special technique called "Kōtei Penguin" (Emperor Penguin), from the Inazuma Eleven series. I will analyze the reasons behind the creation of every single version of this special move, by focusing on the OG series only. The treatise is going to focus on both a psychological and a footballing standpoint. I decided to utilize the english language but also the italian one. I will also make use of some Japanese Kanjis, in order to reach as many readers as i can. Hope you like my work. You can also find the italian version on my AO3 profile.

Enjoy the reading!

Huge thanks to @drunkeninlovesailor for beta reading a part of my work. Love you!

How do you cope when the sport you once loved turns against you?

Kageyama Reijii knows it better than everyone else.

"I'm going to destroy football, because winning is the only option."

CHAPTER 1: Prologue - Mastermind

It all started with a dream, a twisted one.

Kageyama Reiji loved football. He always wanted to play this game, until his father, Kageyama Tōgo, and Endō Daisuke - Endō Mamoru's grandfather - ruined it all.

Kageyama Tōgo was a one of a kind type of striker, a brilliant shooter and a pure talent; his abilities were unmatched, he was feared in every single pitch he stepped foot in. However, things changed when he met a young Endō Daisuke, who challenged him to shoot the ball multiple times towards his goal. Daisuke managed to block Tōgo's shots.

For the first time, someone was able to reach and even surpass Tōgo's level. On top of that, he was replaced by other players of the national team, and his rival, Endō Daisuke, became the leader (and captain) of the legendary "Inazuma Japan" (イナズマジャパン).

Kageyama Tōgo had lost everything. Knowing that he was no longer the best was a bitter pill to swallow, and did not encourage him to improve his skills. He started to play awfully, losing plenty of games. By that time, he had lost all of his passion for football, thus forcing him into a state of depression.

Tōgo became an empty shell and left his family.Kageyama Reiji saw the rise and fall of his glorious father. He lost his mother too, as she got sick and died prematurely due to Tōgo's actions and ineptitude. All of a sudden, Reiji's passion for football vanished. The sport he loved ended up ruining not only his family, but his entire life.

Endō Daisuke coached the poor boy for a few years. He invited him to join "Raimon Jr. High" (雷門中), knowing that he had the same amount of talent of his father. Kageyama accepted and played on that team for a bit. Unfortunately, his idea of football was different from Endō's. He believed that winning was the only option. From his point of view, no one can define himself a champion if he's not ready to do everything in his power to achieve the victory; even if it means destroying and crushing the opponents with illegal methods. Daisuke tried his best to keep Kageyama away from his sorrowful past, his selfishness and his hatred, but it wasn't enough.

Endō guided "Raimon" (雷門中) towards a legendary path, by focusing on the most important aspect of the game.

Team work.

A few years later, Kageyama decided to act on his own. He left "Raimon Jr. High" (雷門中) and joined "Teikoku Gakuen"(帝国学園). During that period he led the team- as a player first and as a Coach afterwards- to a 40 years winning streak.

"I'm going to destroy football".

That was the only thing that mattered to him.

And so he did.

An odd event occured during the FF (Football Frontier) finals. "Teikoku Gakuen" (帝国学園) should've played against Raimon Jr. High (雷門中), in what would've been a match for the ages.

Kageyama assured that the Raimon team wouldn't show up to face his squad.

The bus that transported Daisuke and his beloved players got into an accident, causing the death of Endō Daisuke.

The rest of the team suffered severe injuries and struggled their way to the stadium.

In the blink of an eye, a phone call informed "Teikoku Gakuen" (帝国学園) that the "Raimon" (雷門中) team would not be able to compete, thus, declaring a win by default for Kageyama's team.

Reiji's twisted dream came to reality.

He finally managed to destroy football.

The "Raimon Jr. High" (雷門中) soccer club was dismantled permanently and Teikoku Gakuen(帝国学園) became an unstoppable institute; the best juvenile team of the entire country.

Later on, Kageyama invented the legendary special technique called "Kōtei Penguin", through which he developed his "Masterpiece" and manipulation skills.

At least he thought so.

[mirax00]

Hive for a Wolfpack #2

Chapter 1 - Steady, steady

Enormous thanks to @transformers-spike and @mirax00 for beta reading. Love you guys. The next few chapters are going to take a little longer to write, but fear not, everything has been carefully planned out.

The cuticle you had pulled out with your teeth is stinging like crazy and there are more fingernails inside your stomach than on your fingers themselves. Oh, and you’re driving in the wrong lane. Again.

Not that you really care, since the road in front of you is clearly empty and you’re driving slowly enough to steer whenever necessary. Always ready to play with fire, never actually coming close enough to hurting yourself. Your pick-up is way too old to be exceeding fifty miles per hour anyway, and you have no intention of testing its patience. 

You hum along to the love song playing on the autoradio you had installed to make your trips a little more bearable, and hope the static won’t take over. You’ve lost count of how many songs have played so far, but at least you have company this time. Last week the damn thing broke before you even took off, and all you had for the remaining couple of hours was the not-so-quiet humming of the engine and your own memories. Good thing you can tinker with stuff well enough to fix it yourself.

You yawn just as Dolly hits the last note. You seriously need some rest and peace of mind after today’s grueling shift. And you need a meal, badly. 

Home is not far away, and your garbage body isn’t going to sustain itself on fingernails alone.

Next thing you hear is Kimberly Perry’s soft voice and the guitar beginning in G. You glance at the FM digital display and smile wearily at the title. How fitting. 

Your little angle of paradise in the middle of nowhere is looking suspiciously lonely. There’s always at least one stray cat begging for the scraps you might have saved from your shift — and the cats know you always save something for them, even if your stomach ends up protesting afterward. This time, though, it seems you’ll have to finish your chicken casserole on your own. 

You keep looking around as you step through the dusty pathway and don’t bother to lock your truck. You’re convinced no one would have the guts to come closer to this part of the county, let alone the forest.

There’s an ancient legend about this forest, that if any homes are ever built in its vicinity, their inhabitants will be visited by ill-intentioned fae. Over the years, the story has lost its original Christian connotation in favor of urban legends such as aliens and zombie animals. Sometimes new storytellers would dig up old lore like wendigos. If someone ends up throwing in El Chupacabra, then you’ll have heard it all. 

The scary stories didn’t deter the original owners of this house, nor those who’ve tried to modernize it over the years with little success. After being forced to leave the house belonging to your latest foster parents - bless their souls - you would have settled for a dog house for all you cared. And maybe a dog house is all you’ll get after being evicted from this one. Casual jobs don’t pay, especially manual ones and nobody cares if it’s not your fault you had to drop out of college. 

Not that you ever had much hope for a prolific college career, anyway.

You had moved here, bringing but your melancholy, the relics of your hobbies, your guitar and the old truck that belonged to your foster mom, leaving behind hopes and dreams and the notion of “forever”. On the other hand, the stray animals of the area had grown fond of you, and the spiders didn’t fear building homes inside your own nor did you refuse to share food and shelter with your four-legged neighbors. The spiders help you keep the mosquito population at bay, and that’s enough of a meal for them. 

In a cruel world such as yours, you’ve learned that affections are most likely to pass and entropy is the inevitable destiny of all things. At least, you’ll amuse yourself with the fragile bonds you can form with the equally fragile creatures of the forest. In the end, decay will get all of you.

There’s a little nook beside the house, right beneath the window to your bed. The nook is covered by a sheet of corrugated iron — at least you think it’s iron and not asbestos, but given the age of this house you can’t be sure. It was meant to host logs for the winter, a lawn mower or a motorbike maybe, but since you own neither you’ve allowed the little creatures of the forest to take shelter beneath it. Usually it’s cats, keeping the rodents away. Sometimes you’d find a baby deer, left by some doe with little common sense; sometimes it’d be left empty.

And given that no cats have come begging for your scraps, you assume the nook was left unused today. 

However, there’s a strange chittering noise coming from there, something you can’t quite pinpoint as you look out of your window and try to see past the pitch black beneath the iron roof. It sounds suspiciously like a buzz, but given the crickets outside you’re beginning to blame the noise on them and on your tiredness.

Nonetheless, if there really is a creature down there, you ain’t gonna let it starve. 

“You there”, you begin as you eat a forkful of your chicken casserole, “I ain’t finishing this. Here, take some.”

You scoop up another forkful and spread it on a piece of semi-stale bread, then throw the whole thing out of the window. There, you see a long, spindly appendage emerge from the nook and you can swear you see a metallic sheen under the moonlight. It immediately retracts, leaving a trace in the fresh soil. The chitter stops, then resumes with a low rumble. 

It takes you a moment to register that the appendage did look like the leg of a cricket. A giant, likely carnivorous cricket given how eagerly it retrieved the food.

You should probably scream. Yes, you should scream and close the window and call pest control to take care of whatever thing you just saw. But you don’t. Instead, your sense of self-preservation fails once again as you stick your face out of the window to gain a better view. There you see it again, the metallic sheen. And another sheen, the wet reflection of exposed viscera mottled with patches of fur, blood trickling down to mix with mud. Your mind is quick to suggest the monster you’re currently housing has had dinner already. 

This also explains the suspicious lack of cats. 

“Son of a…”

You’ve tasted death yourself and life in the countryside has hardened you enough not to be repulsed by spilled insides, but it seems not to have taught you common sense as you retreat with your casserole and grab a rifle and knife to go investigate. Considering the total lack of information on your possible foe, you decide to pick the Marlin and hope the recoil won’t dislocate your shoulder blade and pop your collarbone up like a children’s swing. Actually, you hope you won’t have to make use of what dear Pops taught you at all. 

Whatever Xenomorph is down there, you’re positive you’ll best it. And if you don’t survive, neither will it. 

You chew on your lip and grit your teeth. This is eerily similar to the incipit of a cheap horror movie. But then, the protagonist didn’t have a rifle nor a hidden death wish to begin with. 

“I can’t hurl the rest of the casserole at ya’ pal, so y’better see this as a peace offering”, you say as you step closer to the nook. Rifle under one arm, food in the other hand. 

Sympathetic system on alert, you’re ready to shoot if necessary, no matter how sorry you might feel for the poor, hungry monster. 

“You’re certainly not a bear, so that’s a good start”, you continue, not making eye contact with the chittering creature. You try to get a visual despite the shadow covering everything; the corners of your eyes catch a sinister red glow. A talon rakes the soil.  

“You don’t pounce on me, I don’t shoot ya, okay?”

You slowly, very slowly, lower the tupperware onto the ground and again, very slowly, you rise as you get a better grip on your rifle. “Easy, love.”

The monster keeps chittering and you swear you can make out a pair of antennae lifting up on the sides of its head, but it doesn’t approach. You step back slowly, retreating as you sweet-talk it into not seeing you as a threat. Years of doomsday-prepping could never predict this moment, nor how you’d throw everything out of the window for a chance to meet the boogeyman. 

“Steady, like this. You don’t wanna hurt me, I don’t wanna show y’what this baby can do.”

You continue pacing back, free hand slowly getting hold of the other hand of the rifle. Your boots trudge against the soil. You can see its antennae flick back slightly at every step. There’s an eerie rumbling noise, weirdly similar to the one coming from your vehicle when you don’t have music to muffle it. 

“Good, be good for mama.”

You bend your leg around the corner of your house and disappear behind it with one last step, rifle up, senses alert for any sudden noise. None comes, but you don’t lower the weapon as you enter the house. 

Then, a click. 

Something jumps and you hear the hard clank of metal falling onto the ground — the iron roof has been thrown back. You run to the upper room to get a visual and prop the rifle on the windowsill. 

The sight below you is nothing like what you could have expected. 

No fae, certainly not a Chupacabra either, but a giant, metallic grasshopper licking the last scraps of the casserole off the ground. The hellish thing ate the tupperware too. Your whole body recoils as its enormous wings flare up against the moonlight, and you hear it chitter one last time before it prepares to take flight. The entire time, you have your rifle pointed sharply at it and don’t stop even when the buzz of its wings sends a cloud of dust flying in your direction. Its powerful hind legs make contact with the ground and off the monster goes. 

You clench your teeth, muscles tense as you watch it take off into the night and straight into the forest. You look down again and spot a red trail from where the nook once was to the spot where you left the tupperware. And a whole lot of chunks of viscera and fur patches of various colors, burrowed in the corners of the nook. 

You grimace at the sight, this stuff’s gonna stink like crazy in the morning. Guess who’ll have to clean somebody else’s leftovers again?

Well, at least you have to thank your unexpected guest for not making you part of the meal. 

You shake your head and close the window. You have no patience nor fight left to pick up the shovel and give the remnants of your resident cats a proper burial. They can wait a couple of hours, at least before the sun comes up and speeds up the decomposition process.

Your grip is still firm on the rifle as you walk back to lock the door. The truck stays unlocked, eldritch grasshoppers don’t have hands to drive – or at least you hope so. You can’t be certain anymore. That thing had a carapace that shone like a sheet of metal, edges sharper than your best knife and its whole body rumbled like it was housing engines. And you can swear its legs ended in blades. 

You shiver. Too much suggestion.

You put down the rifle and knife, thankful you didn’t have to use them. Then, your gaze falls on none other than a neatly-enveloped eviction notice, right there between your feet. 

They must’ve slipped it in while you were at work. 

The fuckers finally did it. It felt like ages since the first state auction took place, as no one wanted to buy the haunted house at first. Must be some dimwit tycoon ready to turn this place into a big warehouse settlement. You’ve overheard your boss casually mentioning it to his new girlfriend while you were busy soldering a bumper. 

“Won’t be long ‘fore we got metal deer runnin’ wild out in the woods, and shootin’ at ‘em’ll just bounce right off, ha!”

You wonder if that was true already, given your encounter. 

You pick up the envelope, studying it carefully as you chew on your fingernail.

At least they had the decency to grant you the maximum extension of time to pack your stuff and leave. Plenty to find that doghouse. 

Having been a foster kid all your life, you know a thing or two about having your trash bags ready at any shift of the wind. Only difference, this time no one’s coming to pick you up. You thought your latest family would be the last; and indeed, in a cruel turn of events, it was. 

You had grown fond of the lot of ‘em. It had lasted longer than any other. They taught you how to drive, season food, make a fire, pops even taught you how to hunt. How to choose the best weapon. Another reason why you wouldn’t sell any of those. His soul rests in them, every shot cries out his legacy. The truck was an unexpected inheritance, the guitar the only thing keeping you from offing yourself when life feels too heavy. Again, a gift from pops. 

He and ma’ may not have had kids of their own, but they’ve had you for the time it lasted. And whatever’s up there knows how much you strived to be worthy of that. 

You bite a little too hard and your nail chips. It’s fine, a little more keratin as dessert won’t kill you. 

There’s nothing in this house that’s going to pay months of overdue. What little you managed to save after dropping out and settling for the occasional job, had gone towards the initial payments. Then you had to start saving for food, bullets of course, and well, gasoline. Little old shit on wheels drinks more than a tick in a blood bank. 

The house was incredibly cheap at first, enough to make you think you’d be able to handle the rest. But you know, bureaucracy is ready to shove it up your ass the second you feel safe enough to bend over and pick up the pieces. 

“All good things come to an end” as dear Nelly once said, and you know it all too well. You’ll adapt to this too, until entropy gets you. Or your grasshopper and the metal deer get you instead. 

You sigh and shove the envelope in a drawer. Perhaps the only viable drawer in the house. How many pieces of furniture could you sell to set the eviction back? 

Nah, forget that. They’re old and full of termites. 

You lie down on the mattress and wince. The smell of mold has gotten worse — that’s what you get for spending your evenings sprawled on a mattress on the floor and never bothering to clean up the underside of dead skin and debris. Maybe you should buy an anti-mold. Or maybe not, given that you’re to leave this house in a few weeks. 

Yea, who cares. Let the tycoon handle it. 

There’s a rustling noise outside, and for a moment you think your bug monster has come back from the woods. Then you hear the distinct barking of a female raccoon in heat and more growling. Someone’s getting lucky tonight, and again it’s not you.