Greetings, fellow denizens and entities in the multicosmos and beyond! You can call me/us Arcana Magnus (she/xey/they, Arcee is also fine). I've always enjoyed telling stories, and sharing wisdom, and hearing those of other people, transforming together, so this blog was this made so any one or multiple Arcees composing the gestalt can answer your queries, as can our friends and loved ones as occasional guest respondents. While we are not quite as knowledgeable in some respects as Realm of the Primes denizen iteration of Vector Prime, I am more than ready to answer a large variety of questions from our journeys and studies. (philosophically speaking, no we're not canonical, but we will sometimes talk about canon and will let you know when). PfP art by the awesome @fantasticrevery (tumblr)
Lady Arcana Magnus, and the collective that she's associated with therein, which forms of aesthetic variation do you personally find the most appealing or fascinating? Furthermore, which kind of ideal expression do you advise to a queer demimale who has been feeling some feminine aesthetic alignment for some time now, and would thus like to dress or style themselves accordingly? I was told once that I had a certain feminine quality about myself, though back to the core of the question, I suppose I'd love to learn more about your aesthetic experiences in order to learn more about my own potential.
Additionally, in terms of the outer multiverse that you may be aware of, have you ever encountered any variations of Shockwave that were trans, where perhaps learning about themselves and their own internalized biases led them to realize that their present external expression didn't align with what was truly themselves? I suppose I think it would be interesting if a Shockwave was able to better apply her potential in the service of aesthetic liberation :3
The query:
Lady Arcana Magnus, and the collective that she's associated with therein, which forms of aesthetic variation do you personally find the most appealing or fascinating? Furthermore, which kind of ideal expression do you advise to a queer demimale who has been feeling some feminine aesthetic alignment for some time now, and would thus like to dress or style themselves accordingly? I was told once that I had a certain feminine quality about myself, though back to the core of the question, I suppose I'd love to learn more about your aesthetic experiences in order to learn more about my own potential.
Additionally, in terms of the outer multiverse that you may be aware of, have you ever encountered any variations of Shockwave that were trans, where perhaps learning about themselves and their own internalized biases led them to realize that their present external expression didn't align with what was truly themselves? I suppose I think it would be interesting if a Shockwave was able to better apply her potential in the service of aesthetic liberation :3
“Zoomy” Arcana Magnus: Dear Expansive Quester,
I am deeply honored, we all are, that you reached out to us about this. We will answer in three parts, first, regarding the various aesthetics we enjoy for ourselves and in others. Second, giving you tools to navigate your own iteration and desires on your journey for euphoria. As it sounds dress is a part of this, we will advise in that regard overlaid with our own experiences whether binary bond or otherwise, and some questions to consider. We are more than happy for this to be a blog conversation if you wish!
Lastly, we will tell you about some the Shockwaves across variation we’ve met, for we do know some. I myself was close with an Autobot Shockwave, they was an instrumental strategic advisor on Nautica’s command staff in the Great War, and a proud single mentor to the stoic fun-loving Wrecker and Torchbearer errant in love with Windblade, Strongarm. We do know some she pronoun Shockwaves though. <3
On my part, as you may know, I am a trans torquey zoomdare and a gal, the latter from contact with humanity and my trans gal binary bond partner. For those unfamiliar with compound noun aesthetic assemblage terms originating from bots like us under the umbrella systems of sparktion (Cybertronian origin), hearth (Camien origin), voyage (Velocitronian origin), sedneemet (Eukarisian origin) etc. terminology, some of which we first introduced to this world back in early 2022, we will define in brief in this regard:
Cybertron -sparktion - literal meaning: sparklike assemblage, assemblage of sparks, the seeing of trying to understand one's aesthetic singularity as getting to know one's spark.
Caminus – hearth - an aesthetic understanding from the fire of the person and community, of passion, of forging, of dedication, and the universe.
Velocitron – voyage - the love of the journey itself taken very deeply, considered more important than a long resting point of conclusions.
Eukaris - sedneemet - rock affinity based, specifically the intergenerational formation and changing of shape and composure from many different sources.
In regards to specific aesthetics to me zoomdare reflects a sense of a graceful rush in body and mind, it is somewhat comparable to the sensory re-acquaintance euphoria human bodied people experience particularly from doing hormone replacement therapy for aesthetic reasons, however it is also comparable to the reknowing of oneself and the world in other senses, whether meditation, dance, martial arts, whatever one feels at home and in tempo with, what makes one happy. That is more the zoom side typically, however these definitions are self ascribed, not prescriptive. People such as myself speak to the entwining with the other end of the dare portion reflecting an intrepidness in existing and building on that, and also to carry on and care for ourselves and one another, to protect, create, and deescalate all we can.
As such, for people like me, there is also a bodily component- while a zoomdare can be any shape, say a telescope or microscope bot in the zoom and/or daring of their magnification, or a building bot one with their surroundings and denizens- for many of us it is the altmode shape to soar or flit about or charge or outmaneuver or race or flow that affirms us- for me, being a robust high speed car with some torque and reflecting that in my bot mode shape and my fields of study makes me very happy. Windblade, Anode, Velocity, Aileron, Hot Shot, Trans-Mutate and many more also know themselves with their frames in a similar manner. As a mutualist in attraction, that is to more similar aesthetic assemblages while still reveling in symbiosis of our differences- I find that attractive, and there is a tank Shockwave who fits that profile for me, but we won't talk about her until the end of this post (my understanding is that the feeling is mutual, but we've decided not to act on it. sometimes attraction is just that).
But the truth is most bots of my world feel some affinity to zooming and daring, just as I do to holding, wooshing, booming, clawing, flapping, chords, spinning, flares, seeking, forging, the torque, blazing, plunging, the absences thereof, the whys, the hows, the whens, and where’s and on and on. We do after all have hundreds of thousands of years to have built up an assemblage viewpoint, to know ourselves as compounds of so much. In this way. My realizations of myself created a new kinship with my symbiotic launch tank-alt torquey wooshhow twin sibling Galvatron, for he could see and embrace through me what taking on mutualistic trans zoomdareness would have been like for him.
Regarding torque- it's a way of referring to the rapid build-up and force of momentum of persona and/or euphoria of such in the frame and the ensuing results in contact with the world. It is somewhat comparable to your term “butch” from lesbian and sapphic terminology as one butch lesbian Spacewarp realized dating torquedare Perihelion, however as you can tell from the fact symbiotist Galvatron uses it the term torque, like the rest of our aesthetics, are not mere analogs for gender. They are our own parallel and vastly differing iteration that has some amusing overlaps. Some examples of primarily torque folks include Elita One, Pyra Magna, and Optimus Prime (all torqwhy), Road Rage (torqdare), Cliffjumper, Arr-Cee (a motorcycle bot I am close to), and Catapult (zoomtorqdares), whereason the holding or being held and knowing when to let go ranges from as small as Lug (holddare), to Titans like Lodestar (zoomholddare).
There will always be aesthetic contextualization and iteration, there has been as long as there has been life to experience of it, so at the very least as long as there has been sapient life- and in that sense, will always be around no matter how hard people try to erase it, and even should all life perish, we carry on in love’s memory forevermore beyond the question of physics or gods.
“Prof” Arcee: while my world and that of Arcees you are familiar with use gender, the situation is similar. Our genders are linked to one another, and inform and are informed by alt mode and relation to it. I am a mutualist trans alt modus iterexper gal, so I am polygender in that way, and even in how harsh and tragic my world’s history was, we did still have many beautiful understandings, and though I would not know the word zoomdare until I was very old, we were building towards that framework, for example I did know I liked some torque to me, and this was actually a point of grief since Jhiaxus’s transmedicalist reformat of me in his rigid ideal of a woman and not what I wanted for gender affirmation as a gal, did not take that into account or more accurately ignored it. I would take millions of years to be brave enough to take on robustness again within the shapes I actually wanted.
Regarding your question- I would encourage you to reflect from yourself and the world around you. What kind of gals or femme-spectrum folks do you look up to or aspire to be like? What clothing makes you happy? That will help answer your question. While clothing is not really my thing…
“Arcblade” Danielle Witwicky: if its not tough color schemed armor that allows maneuverability, I like a-skirts and dresses, because I can move easily in them, more easily than pants (not that I’ve worn pants for along time, hard to do as an exosuit cyborg), and I tend towards a stately appearance if I am bothering with clothes. Anything can be feminine if you want it to be, it's just a question of what resonates with you.
“Zoomy” Arcana Magnus: regarding Shockwaves, yes, we know of some who are trans, and some who even though they are not had their own epiphanic cycles entangled with the journeys of other people. The Shockwave I know from my life uses they/them, a zoomdare, is aconjunxic and asensual, and struggles with emotions. They however were raised in a loving community of my world’s Golden Age, that showed them to observe and understand that there is wisdom and reason for a society of mutual aid, consensus, care, and solidarity, and while they may struggle with being compassionate and loving emotionally, the concepts themselves make sense to them, and they know that we love them. There is one entity in the universe they do love dearly, can hug close most easily- their mentee, the brave and sweet gamer Torchbearer errant Strongarm, who they raised on Caminus in the late Golden Age, since they foresaw that world would play such a particular role in the aesthetic Autobot Revolution. Shockwave was a scientist of astronomy, physics, and engineering, but they also intently studied civilian and military strategy, and would go on to serve as one of the strategic command advisors to stratelect Nautica, who advised and coformed much of the strategic planning with Supreme Commander Optimus Prime on behalf of our pluralistic democratic government at the galactic level of the war. It was Shockwave who was the chief architect of the system by system, sector by sector randomized strategem algorithm offensive late in the war that made us unpredictable in our offensive late in the war against the remaining Decepticon sectors, before Nautica led the command of a unified consolidation of special forces interdiction, fleet-scale peaceful penetration, and wave based planetary deployment with direct tactical ground support and in tandem with Decepticon defectors.
It was my personal honor as a Prime and as elected Director of the Anchor special forces and thus one of the joint chiefs to present Shockwave with the Medal of Cosmic Survival, for their algorithm that they monitored and edited with real-time sapient input until conventional command resumed to have so thoroughly mitigated civilian casualties and maintained as primary priority the safeguarding of them above all else in a chaotic situation where we retreated from some regions and made full frontal assaults in others.
I won’t lie. Even with our pacifist military (which we in the brass knew was an oxymoron and were always looking for the day when we could build peace instead of fight to survive) considerations of not engaging in strategic bombing or bombardment of any targets that was not confirmed to be solely a conventional military base or holding with a confirmed lack of civilian presence in or close enough to be collateral, that even with maintaining only use of tactical direct support otherwise and de-escalatory doctrine always looking to find grounds for mutual reparation, restitution, restoration, and reconciliation, people were caught in the crossfire throughout the war even on the infantry scale. Even when the killing usually reached only the target in mind that itself is still a sadness and atrocity. It weighs on my conscience, on all of us. We cried a lot about it, and it’s the whole damn reason Anode and Lug made a plea to both sides to stop because of the sheer amount of trans people, and people generally, who had died on both sides over 500,000 years of war. But that’s a story for another time. Suffice it to say that at least we did not try to declare our cause just, to excuse what we did, and that even though it was the Decepticons who had seceded and tried to coup us with their stratocracy that eventually became neo-Functionist genocidal reactionary totalitarianism and as such eventually had a civil war with those who didn’t agree, that we did not annex them, that we helped to reconstruct democracy with them when all was said and done, and that we repaid all we could for the hurt we caused, just as they did for us.
Shockwave helped with that. They, like me, gave up their rank, helped to rebuild damaged polities by hand, to ensure the traumatized received care, to step in the way of conflict and not return violence in turn, like the peaceful intercessions of old in cycles of violence during the Golden Age. To risk their life as someone working for the dream with their integrated cannon deactivated and stuffed with cyberflowers, working with their one arm, and hauling supplies on their treads. They told me they were happy when, years afterwards, they were instead tugging youngsters along on field trips to the observatory.
"Prof" Arcee: I could talk about the Shockwave of my world
It is my understanding that some Shockwaves do know themselves as trans gals. One such example is a Shockwave from the Tyran Cluster who found her way onto Axiom Nexus after a Spacebridge accident while helping AllSpark bearer Multivalia Prime (Chromia) take down the Fallen in order to save the new forged population of Cybertron from being forced into an army and dying. But because of her pushing for offworlder equality simply because it made more sense than the extractive jus sanguinis hierarchy, she was pushed by bruisers affiliated with the Freelance Police Legion into the Heap, where she joined up with the Unified Anarchists League in trying to make the best of scarce resources through caring for one another and finding joy in resistance- it was in learning to dance and the way of the sword that she realized herself as a gal, and as the bots of her universe could do, simply changed her shape to reflect what that personally meant for her. She rationalized having armored skirt halves like Anode’s that in this case form part of Shockwave’s tank armor because the skirts have pockets, but she did later admit that the moment to moment life and emotive expression her t4t partner Anode had through them is why she took them on for herself. After the post-Shroud revolution that brought a new consensus of equality to Axiom Nexus, I met her via a Multiverse Drive ship that ‘Backpack” Arcee was on, and we shared stories with each other. Shockwave seemed very happy.
Do you still meet some of the members of the sheild of solus from time to time like elita, moonracer and firestar?
"Zoomy" Arcana Magnus: We do. Danielle and I adore hanging out with them when we can. We stayed together as a unit for much of the War, combining frequently all the way through to our deployment alongside the Wreckers and Autobot Intelligence to defeat the Decepticon Justice Division's last major fortress and liberate the prisoners there- including the prototype Primus/Unicron planetoid form who took on the name Gaea and Cybertronian she pronouns after our attached Cityspeakers and Greenlight helped cut through the Funcronist* code impeding her processes.
*(Funcronism is an amalgam of Functionist and Unicronist ideologies, and Funcronist infiltration of the Decepticons and running their judicial faction while gaslighting Megatron was instrumental to the Decepticon's descent from autocratic stratocracy into totalitarianism which was eventually responded to with the Decepticon Civil War, a story for another time)
And we stayed together after that. Those who didn't already live there moved to Caminus with me, dear neighbors and extended family besides darlings Greenlight and Lancer and Chromia (Chromia's more Windblade, Nautica, Road Rage, and Strongarm's partner but my end of the polycule does enjoy tangling with her from time to time, sparring and dancing in particular something we enjoy among other aspects of intimate trust that we smooch over occasionally). Though Cybertron is currently the political capital of the Autobot Alliance once more, there is much talk about moving the gathering of our highest delegations and councils back to Caminus, which was the de facto capital for a significant portion of the war. Elita, Galebreach Convoy (Windblade's formal Prime name) and I and many other Primes have already set up a secondary Primal Expanse here, no easy feat with how much Matrix cyberform architecture we had to do, exhausting. Anode (also a Matrix bearer, she elected not to change her name), had an innovative approach of having blacksmiths aid us in the shaping, so it at least took less time than it did in ancient days for Solus and her early colleagues.
Lifeline and I tend to chat over a boardgame or meditate together. Moonracer and I love to go racing, Firestar of course I see frequently since she is amicably enamored with Nautica and her Amica Endura polycule (consisting of four previously named alongside Rung, Nightbeat, Brainstorm, Velocity, and Skids), and Elita, Greenlight, Lancer, and I have spent quite a bit of time learning Cityspeaking in order to stay in touch with Gaea.
"Arcsword" Danielle Witwicky: the Shield of Solus has also grown as an organization in peacetime. Given my position in it continuing the now ancient transformer society iteration of multispecies membership in nearly every intergalactic group transformers have had a major part in forming- we have had more from the galaxy join us in this capacity and have become teachers of a sort about the War, and about peace. I'll never forget the look on Solus's face when she told us thank you, for transforming her name into something far beyond her status as a Prime. A delta vector of change, an amusing parallel to the Delta League of Prof that instead reclaimed a monarch Solus's Forge of Solus Prime as gender expansive symbology and because of the history of her federation closely entwined with affirmation practices and gender affirmation across Cybertron before the First Cybertronian Civil War (this name of a conflict we've mentioned here is a canonical conflict in IDW1, where "Prof" Arcee is from but nothing else we have said in regards to that continuity in this post is canonical).
"Prof" Arcee: though I worked with a Novastar (no, not the Camien Firestar, a different gal, the military civil guard commander of Uraya early on during Nova Prime's rule) and Lifeline in the Delta League, what I would have given to have Greenlight, Chromia, Lancer, and Moonracer of my world beside me in the often armed liberation movement against Functionism and Nova Prime- save for the fact that I would never have wished that upon them. The way conflict went on and on and how most of us left was so sad... I would chalk it up to how equivalently annoying it would be to live for 4 million years as guerrillas against a Shockwave whose first response to discovering the Shield of Solus was to yell "FEMALES!?"
"Pistoleer" Arcee: yeah your Shockwave and mine were real pieces of work when it came to gender huh. I'm glad to still be in touch with my Shield of Solus team, they did vital work for the liberation and defense of Cybertron and Earth during my more well known adventures (this is also not canonical per se, if only). Being away from Greenlight and Lancer often was excruciating even though duty demanded we attended to our posts, I thankfully no longer have to worry about that. We still hang out together, actually currently we are looking for colonies we lost contact with or that fell, in particular to keep be able to respond in places where er 'Female Autobots didn't go extinct' which is impossible without destroying the two entwined ideas and all sapient life...
Prof & Pistoleer: *laughter*
"Pistoleer" Arcee: that said directly experiencing Danielle's two adolescences through our binary bond was maybe one of the largest challenges I myself have faced, and I was certainly amused by the second one, and did all I could to help her with both. No wonder organic bodied people have a hard time with hormones, with all the stuff they do! Truly admirable how you all live in your flesh.
"Flanker" Danielle Witwicky: right back at you. A Cybertronian staying in good health means a lot of mechanical upkeep, and I feel it every time Lifeline has to give you a tune-up. The fact you don't heal the same way I do makes things complicated.
the arcee singularity is happening again & its happening in the fucking mainline
film rotb arcee is trans by Arcee Singularity logic end of discussion lol (also sincere on the trans iterations of Arcees character &/or physical aesthetic stuff are across Arcees now, starting w/ TR & comic crossovers)
Arcana Magnus: Haha well you know since you date us (I know who sent this ask they told me) that I'm very polyamorous, and am part of a large polycule so... it's really more of a question of how maxed out I am at a given time whether or not I am open to new partners.
Danielle Witwicky: says the zoomdare always down for a good sparring and smooching after with someone xey trust~
Arcana Magnus: I don't really have a rebuttal to that except that I do have to get to know someone and decide if I'd be comfy and interested in that way, orientation accounted for and all. I'm rather mutualistic, that is to say, attracted to people who I share more of my sparktion/hearth and gender or parallel aesthetics who I have more in common with in that regard than not. You could sort of compare that to being a sapphic/lesbian but as I will discuss another time zoomdare =/= woman one for one, it's more that there's some overlaps and my relationship to gender is a bit complicated. Nothing new for an Arcee though I suppose-
"Prof" Arcee: Hopefully when you're as old as me it'll have grown so much that the complexity and dissonance doesn't bug you anymore. I know myself better as a woman, iteration-experiential, and altmodus car all now than I ever imagined I would seven million years ago. Honestly, the way things are going linguistically for my world, I think zoomdare is a word we had been trying to piece together, to understand.
Arcana Magnus: I certainly hope so *smooch*, and I look forward to being around for that.
"Prof" Arcee: mmm, do you want to spar later? Invite your partners, I invite mine?
Lancer: oh my gods you two-
*general laughter*
Lancer: I love you.
Arcees: we love you too. --technical difficulties to note there's some trouble with the color coding but that shouldn't be a problem since we planned on using nicknames anyway-- also uh yeah this and the last post aren't canon at all harhar. We think we will adopt a 'only note something is or is not canon when talking about canon' policy from here on out. Just because we may forget to constantly distinguish the two otherwise.
hello arcana whats it like working on the solus shield resistance?
Arcana Magnus: ah, that's an interesting story... you see, Solus Prime is my grandmentor. She and Amalgamous alongside Azimuth helped my laborer-teacher mentors Gallium and Feldspar to raise Galvatron and I. Primes where I come from are- not people with direct political power from their title. They are more advisors, who navigate their personal life with the help of the wisdom of a Matrix while taking a role in the collective good as a Prime. Sometimes of course, this does lead to them to become sages, knights errant, archivists, scientists, artists, in a different path than their life before, from the realizations a Matrix comes with... and when there is unfortunate need, war leaders. Solus- deeply cared for the iteration of the cosmos, whether the causality and variability around us or contextual formation and internal creation and imagination we are capable of, from dust to dust, a reflection of a deeper truth of the world. They loved to make things, forging tools for the people to use, teaching people to do so, building some of our first train lines, working on our first FTL engine, and, to her joy- presiding over aesthetic affirmation surgeries. She wasn't a blacksmith, so she couldn't help with initial protoform shaping the way dear Anode can just with hands, but sometimes extra help is needed then or after.
In my case, more than a century after, with her and Minerva's help, working with the parts I forged with tools to bring my own realizations into shape, but I couldn't quite add them to myself.
The Shield of Solus formed in my grandmentor's honor, to lead the defense the AllSpark and the Core of Cybertron as she had against the Functionist coup of our Cybertronian pluralistic democracies, and did again when the Decepticons attempted to strike at the same time Unicronists and Neo-Functionists did. When the Great War reached a point where it was clear it wouldn't end any time soon, she gave up her Matrix, now beared by Elita One- the head of the Shield of Solus, the vanguard command team of the Elite Guard.
It was hard, those millennia when Cybertron was blockaded and besieged by a Decepticon fleet from the Rim. Seeing polities and landscapes we had rebuilt after the Unicron incursion and the Functionist coup thereafter bombarded to rubble again... so many fleeing deep underground for protection from the Core once more... The team I fought alongside made it bearable. Greenlight, one of my dear loves, kept us alive with her hacking and intel skills, as darling Lancer also did as an engineer, and the two are both quite skilled combatants in their own right at range and up close. I often was in the role of a sniper duo with Moonracer, or wading into melee with Chromia, and advising Elita's command of the guerrilla defense of Cybertron while we waited for our galactic alliance to cut through as we tried to drive the Decepticons away. And Firestar dragged me out of the rubble or put out fires on my frame more than once, guarding me until Lifeline or another medic could reach me.
More than anything, the close-knit spirit, the endearing touch and care and friendship, made the three of us who were partners feel at home with them. We had moved to Caminus after the Functionist War, but the events leading up to the Great War brought us and our neighbor Firestar back to Cybertron often, and we were there for a strategy session when the Decepticon armada led by Six Shadow struck. Moonracer, a Velocitronian, was reporting in for defensive Wrecker duties in the Hadean, and Lifeline was a medic on staff for Paradron's delegation in the Autobot Alliance. Elita's flagship battlecruiser was the first ship to be struck, rammed in a surface repair yard by a Decepticon dreadnought, both ships lost in the process, devastating the Hydrax Plateau with a massive detonation from the sheer mass and acceleration, dwarfing any of your nuclear weapons, more akin to crashing a large asteroid into the Earth. I did not see the Hadean sun with my own optics for many years. So-
We gave them all our fury, and each other all our sweetness, and compassion and understanding to all. We fought as Autobots do. We cried, we laughed, we raged, we kept our heads cool most of the time, but it was hard.
The day we led a marine assault on Six Shadow's flagship and took down the Phase Sixer with our thermal weaponry and ununtrium rounds was one of the most relieving of my life, and to embrace Aileron, Grimlock, Galvatron, Windblade, Strongarm, Gauge, and Sideswipe, helped make it all feel real, that we had actually succeeded. By this point, we of the Shield of Solus felt close enough to try using an Engima of Combination to combine together, such was our trust. But that is a story for another time... <3
It was an absolute delight to draw their version of Danielle and Arcee! Check out their RP blog!
I still have commissions open! My patreon, Ko-fi if you are interested in seeing how this art work was made, or want a high res version of this drawing!
Arcana Magnus: hi yes this is the art we're using for our ask-blog indeed! Please feel free to ask us things-
Danielle Witwicky: we look so pretty and dashing, such a good likeness. I love you-
Arcana Magnus: love you too darling *hug*
Danielle Witwicky: So, some of you may be wondering about our story... I'll tell a little bit about two of me (this is not canon information although much of this first paragraph is): the emotional and sweet gunslinging kid you might know from the Sunbow cartoon telling of the tale as Daniel (I don't mind people using that name for me I just also use Danielle both make me happy and are ones I associate with my galness) was seriously injured in 2007 CE when I (there will be some continuity slips in the gestalt that's why I'm using I here) was seriously injured helping Arcee fight Snapdragon. What with the opportunity to use headmaster technology thanks to the Nebulan resistance, Arcee volunteered to have her systems be used as life support for me- her head reconfigured to be able to transform into an exosuit for me, so we had a binary bond, working closely together, building on the sweet mentoring trust she had already given me previously, and proving quite the effective duo in combat.
With everything we went through risking body and mind to help save the world, and still sharing our bond after as we helped rebuild Nebulos and looked after the future of Earth and Cybertron... by the time 2008 rolled around, I was fifteen, and had a sort of hybrid education with some formal actual Earth schooling while the rest was Cybertronian education, and well, informally, learning from Arcee every day of my life thereafter.
Her prowess, her sweetness, the power she wielded from who she had made herself, her attentive outspoken demeanor that situated us as the right hand of Optimus Prime and set part of my life on the path of a warrior sage, all amazed me, all things I wanted in the way she did it that I had not known I had longed for. When we first met the other Solus Shield resistance fighters besides Chromia, that is, Elita One, Moonracer, Firestar, and the adorable couple Greenlight and Lancer whom Arcee was enamored with, I realized that... I wanted to be a gal, or knew myself as one from then on. Cybertron's history of ever transforming gender was one I found deep comfort in, and so, though it wasn't so easy back in 2008 (and in the 2023 CE we are posting this there are still many barriers including transmedicalizations), I started hormone replacement therapy, something that Arcee, to her amusement, experienced through her connection to me and my body. Her happiness for me is a joy that I cherish deeply, and it is a loop, for at this point, she is me, and I am her.
The two in the picture above though- somewhat different situation. That Danielle is a cyborg, for one. She er, wanted more of the metal framework in terms of bodily experience. Arcee, if you want to-
"Zoomy" Arcana Magnus: I do, I'll tell the rest. I grew up on a Cybertron where, though we had some conflicts from time to time, aesthetics of self and community was deeply celebrated as everyday and remarkable. Our first word for something like what many of you know as gender was sparktion, that is, of the spark, sparklike, since we saw it as something one tries to figure out from the soul and contextualize from lived experience and creativity, but can't ever fully know. For me- that meant eventually realizing I wanted a different frame than that I shared with my dear brother and fellow Autobot Galvatron, wanting to still ahve a robust shape but have more of a slope and curve, to have two lovely back stacks with wheels- to feel a graceful rush to my movements and thoughts and life realized through reshaping my body. My words for this sparktion to me are zoomdare. There are some parallels and overlaps with galness- but it is not the same.
I designed and forged the parts I would add to my body by hand. I couldn't do the surgery myself, but my grandmentors Solus Prime and Amalgamous did, and apart from sensory side effects (that for me only lasted a few weeks) not unlike what humans can experience from HRT or surgery, I was deeply glad with my form, and it gave me so much happiness that helped me find balance in life apart from studying wisdom and practicing it and having a community and health resources to turn to. There are other parts of the story to tell- but, regarding Danielle... I was about 200 years old when we made contact with humanity in the early history of transformer originated society. Human bodied folk were in their 2800s CE, and had made new homes on other star systems, like Gliese Exiom, where I met Danielle in her fifties, a mechatronic engineer who had long studied the history of gals and gender expansive folk at war, peace, and revolution, and read quite a bit of fiction in that regard but hadn't really found an answer to their gender stuff and had left that be. As part of a diplomatic bonding program, they and I both volunteered to binary bond-
it was initially dysphoric, for me. Her gender stuff, though rapidly exploding with epiphany and euphoria from contact with me, was not something I was used to, the way she thought about things and all the implications and history gender carried good and bad. It was too much. I could see why she with contact with my mind realized xenogender stuff in relation to my zoomdareness. She felt lonely in that too, even though patriarchy and empire had been dead for her species for the last two centuries.
So, for a while, she kept her stuff from me in our mental link and cyborg patching when they was inside my head, and I stayed an open door. But, eventually, I came to know galness another way that was euphoric to me- Earth vehicles. I took up another reformat from combining the designs of two such sport and muscle cars- and now we share freely with each other.
I helped her raise a family with the Nebulan jixurque (an aesthetic we'll have to tell you about sometime) Llyra, and the two helped me, Aileron, Lancer, Greenlight, Anode, and Lug to raise Gauge and Sideswipe II. We have fought Neofunctionists, Unicronists, and Decepticons, and took part in the aesthetic Autobot Revolution. We do our own things separately sometimes but it's rare now. I don't know what I would do if I lost her the way I've lost Hardhead and Sideswipe and Kup-
"Prof" Arcee: hey, you okay? If you need to talk, I'm always here, you know I know how loss feels, how I felt when I thought Anode and Lug were dead, when I thought I was alone.
"Zoomy" Arcana Magnus: I'll be okay, thank you though. Maybe we should talk, because the thought scares me.
Danielle is- one of the dearest people in my life. I don't know how to say, to phrase, the kind of love I feel for her. It is a deep kinship but even that is an understatement.
Also yes she's a sword sapphic/lesbian apart from sharing my mutuality but I think that was fairly obvious
Danielle Witwicky: harhar, what gave it away, emulating you?
Arcana Magnus: for our first post, we thought we'd get some help from the Earth we post on! Transformers media in your world is to sell toys after all (aside from people wanting to tell a story) and we thought some the customs in this photo would help set the tone even though talking via toys won't usually happen (and well, the unofficial Ask Vector Prime 2 has done digibashes paired with prose storytelling, so not new ground really). Please feel free to send us asks, even for things canon hasn't answered! :3
We're talking about canon here besides touching on those two. Here's the alt text/dialogue so people can read it this way, its a bit lengthy because of the amount of dialogue:
Alt text: A photo of transforming toys on a windowsill, with a trans flag for the background flooring, and a dark blue / purple night-time cardboard backdrop of a scifi city of cybertronian inspiration. The figures are engaged in combat and talking:
Titan Returns Arcee has her pistols out and is firing one into Siege Ion Storm's chest point blank, which has a blast effect there representing the impact, with a KABLAM orange-pink sound description above. TR Arcee is looking at Legends Arcee and saying: "So, you used to have a human body and then because you wanted to be a transformer from seeing the toys you became one? That’s so cool. I’m both a gal from Cybertron and binary bonded with a human who’s a dear friend of mine at this point- and our writing has now and my design is inspired from our trans iterations."
Ion Storm: "GAH- yeah your toy is cool as hell, it’s nice that things came full circle and car TTRPG Arcee can use her car hood as a shield.
Legends Arcee meanwhile stands on top of a collapsing Beast Hunters Shockwave, cutting his cannon in twain with a sword while stabbing Shockwave through his mono-optic face with her other sword: "Indeed! And yeah, my writing isn’t too great and I’m sexualized in a way that isn’t very tasteful or about me having agency in that regard, but as a concept me becoming a bot is fantastic, it’s a sentiment that resonates with the nonhuman community particularly human-bodied robot folk. Hopefully I’ll get better writing in a new iteration someday…"
Her attacks have similarly pink-orange sound effects of CLANG and CRUNCH.
Shockwave: Urk- I would hope for more logic… bleh
Behind her, Studio Series 86 Arcee is kneeling, with her pistol on her thigh, and Generations Selects Galvatron's fusion cannon held over her shoulder, firing it with blast effects into staggered Kingdom Cyclonus's shoulder and a SKWOMP sound effect: "Funny that we’re talking about this, besides my binary bond with Daniel, I did have a synthoid human body briefly, though I didn’t sign up for that. I think I wore overalls pretty well and certainly have a better understanding from my binary bond that was voluntary."
Nearby, a T30 Arcee painted in trans and lesbian flag patterns and guns on her backstacks has beheaded a falling T30 Jhiaxus with her sword. Jhiaxus's neck socket has a blast effect exploding upwards like pressured blood/fuel. T30 Arcee is looking at an Arcee customized from Legacy Elita-1 to resemble IDW1 Arcee, and T30 Arcee's speech bubble says: "Hmm, I mean, Transformers has always danced around that with the ‘transformers are humans in robot bodies with alien context’ concept in terms of writing- the toy design two of you are retooled from, me minus my custom pride flag paint job, though, definitely hits that sexualization thing. My concept design was going to be the basis for IDW1 Arcee over there in 4th reformat with a surgery that she was happy with as part of her gender journey, but the comics were so ahead from schedule that there wasn’t much of me to go on. Thankfully the artist wanted to keep in line with the comic aesthetic, so she looks different."
The IDW1 Arcee custom, erstwhile, who has cut into Jhiaxus's wing with her flaming orange blade with a pink and cyan FWOOSH sound and a fiery blast effect on top of her blade, is glancing at Legacy Arcee, and saying: "Yeah, that loops back around to the basis of Titan Returns Arcee, although I’m not sure that’s why she’s a Blurr retool. I mean, I feel like a Legacy Elita retool to Arcee with swords is fairly obvious route to go and it seems there are other people who think that, given the robust look I have from 2014-2018 (and that’s not even counting how other Arcee iterations drawn in Transformers vs. GIJOE, or IDW2, or Transformers vs. Terminator). I dunno, there’s something to be said for how root designs that look ‘overly human’ can work, my second reformat is in that category and outside of one cover with Galvatron that hasn’t aged well it’s not really focused on, which I think is interesting in retrospect even though it wasn’t intentional for a trans narrative. But yeah it is funny to see you on covers sometimes given the difference."
Legacy Arcee, who unlike her pink car bot companions, is a blue motorcycle, is in point blank contact with an unlicensed toy based on Airachnid (APC Night Countess), while Arcee's forearm blades are out, and she has 3D print blasters pointed at Airachnid's chest and head, taking a headshot with a blast effect over Airachnid's face, and Arcee is saying: "It’s still absurd to me that the only appearance of my Legacy form in canon media outside of toy stuff is me in a leotard or a swimsuit. Clothing is cool and all but am I hiding, and if it’s for fun why aren’t any of the guys doing the same thing too? I’m more partial to the fact that most of the time we are all basically walking around nude save for a few of us, and those who do wear clothes don’t do so on a basis of being a gal. I would much rather take being curvy with metal boobs while living sweetly and ferociously."
