Snapshot 👏 timeline 👏 time
Now, this is all subject to change, but I finally have Snapshot's (my IDW oc) backstory stuff sorted out. Everything here takes place before MTMTE.
TWs before we get into the meat of things
Discussions of PTSD, cannibalism, suicidal ideations, implied emotional grooming, VIOLENT CONTENT, unhealthy relationships, depictions of sex work, addiction, depictions of abuse, substance abuse(?)
This is a character with PTSD that became dependent on extremely unhealthy coping mechanisms for said PTSD. Please be mindful and respectful of that. Signed, someone who also has PTSD.
Generally speaking, his lore is kinda depressing so if you don't fuck with dead dove stuff, turn back now. I'll be using the tag #Sparkhunter for him.
Sparkhunter explained
Prediction algorithm explained
Pre/early war
Constructed cold in Vos, Snapshot was originally kind of shy and reserved. He was a courier before the war and was constructed with spark sensitivity and advanced facial recognition software to better do his job. But deep down he idolized mechs like Nightbeat and always wanted to be a detective/PI. Under functionism that's nigh impossible, but it didn't stop him from creating a personal database of everyone he encountered during his career. Coworkers and the like made note of how he could recognize anyone and give a short blurb about them, and it earned him his namesake. Did he want to make the most of his abilities? Yes. But he was content and comfortable with where he was at, so he kept on delivering packages.
As the war begins, he finds himself delivering medical supplies for the Autobots. The Swarm has been starting to grow and Cybertron is becoming less and less habitable, but he still must carry on. He's then shot down by Decepticon troops over a particularly nasty Swarm infested area. Grounded after a rough crash and with supplies he can't make any use of, it's only a matter of time before he becomes prey to the Swarm (as seen below, bc not everyone knows about it).
Herein enters what I've dubbed the Swarm Queen. A much larger and aggressive member of the failed insecticons. Over the course of a couple weeks, she slowly hunts down Snapshot while tearing him apart piece by piece. This event serves as a major point of trauma for Snapshot and catalyzes several things later down the line, but we'll get to that as it becomes relevant. What matters is him running for his life with a body that's falling apart, being hunted down by a monster that's playing with it's food. It's been weeks, he's low on fuel and severely damaged. The Swarm Queen is finally closing in on him. He can hear it coming closer as he scrabbles for cover, praying that his death is swift and painless. But the jaws of the beast never close around him. In a flash of fire and showmanship befitting a certain young speedster, he's saved from death's clutches by none other than Hot Rod!
Hot Rod calls in a rescue team as he comms base, saying he's found a survivor amidst the wreckage. The two get to know each other as Hot Rod won't stop yapping about what happened to anyone who would listen. People chalk it up to Hot Rod being Hot Rod and move on with their day. But some listen to the story and pay attention when he talks about the mech who survived the entire ordeal. How a young mech by the name of Snapshot survived such a terrifying encounter. How against all odds, he managed to survive and lived to tell the tale. And one day, Snapshot's approached by Prowl with a proposition.
"Hey kid, how would you like to join my Special Ops team as a spy?" But y'know, not said as nicely bc it's Prowl. So the next logical course of action obviously is to fake your death. Can't have the Decepticons drawing connections on a double life, so kill the first one so you can start over. However, 99% of the Autobots weren't told bc you can't expect that many people to keep a secret. This includes Hot Rod, and we will get back to that later.
Decepticon arc/Verator
So here comes along this lil newbie Decepticon named Verator (who is definitely not Snapshot, nope). No one really looks into it bc like. War. They can't afford to be picky about who joins, and they simply just don't know. His ability more than makes up not doing a thorough background check tho. Advanced facial recognition and great memory banks? Sounds like the perfect fit for a Grindcore prison warden to me! It goes about as well as you would expect. He meets Tarn and Skids tho! There is that!! Both are too busy with other matters to really pay attention to Verator tho.
Now, Verator has PTSD from the Swarm incident. He gets really bad nightmares and such involving the attack. Grindcore doesn't help with this matter, so he goes to therapy to try and alleviate the issue. Enter Froid, the most trustworthy guy around. The two have on/off sessions for a while, and don't seem to really get anywhere. Then suddenly Froid has the bright idea that maybe mnemosurgery could actually help and recommends Verator look for any surgeons he could schedule an appointment with.
Trepan. Verator goes to Trepan. Trepan is not a trustworthy mnemosurgeon. Trepan immediately finds out about Verator being a spy. Trepan blackmails and manipulates Verator into letting him "play" with his mind. Trepan is not a good mech. We don't like Trepan.
Essentially, he finds out and decides to have some fun with a tormented Autobot. Through a combination of manipulation, weaponizing guilt, sadism, morbid curiosity, psychosis, and a bit of sparkeater code, Trepan gives Verator a very unhealthy coping mechanism. You see, Verator doesn't like being hungry. It reminds him of the empty tanks he had to live with while being hunted. So we just scramble and corrupt the memories a bit and introduce some spark energy to the tanks and uh oh! Whenever Verator gets hungry now, his higher cognitive functions start to shut down and he becomes a beast with a taste for innermost enegon. The energon fills his tanks and satisfies that new touch of sparkeater with the lingering trace of spark energy found in innermost. Doesn't help that he's always been a bit spark sensitive either.
"Why did Trepan break this poor mech?" I hear you ask. Simple, Trepan is batshit insane and immediately saw an opportunity to see how far a single mech could be pushed before he would break. Getting blackmailed and pressured by both Froid and Trepan now to keep coming back so Verator can "be fixed" only perpetuates the abuse. They mock him for being a failure of an Autobot, standing idly by while his people are being slaughtered in Grindcore. "If they knew, they would want nothing to do with a mech as worthless as you," they say. And they're not entirely wrong.
Verator keeps pinging Prowl all the while with an SOS signal and their exchanges regarding the matter go a little something like this.
"Has your position been compromised to the Decepticons?"
"No, but…"
"Is your life at risk?"
"Not really, but…"
"Then what is the issue."
"I'm being targeted and harassed by two Autobots and they're making my life really difficult."
"Tough shit."
"Help me!"
"Couldn't even if I wanted to. We can't intervene unless you're in active danger or are at risk of breaking cover. Intervening on whatever's going on would bring unwanted attention to you and could put the entire operation at risk. Figure it out yourself."
So Froid and Trepan didn't like the fact that Verator kept pinging the Autobots. They don't want whatever the fuck it is that they're doing to be discovered and shut down.
"Oh honey, don't you know your precious Autobots aren't gonna come save you?"
"Here, let's show Verator how they really feel about him."
So the two sell him out to Pharma, a mech who historically hates Decepticons. Verator is then forced to undergo empurata without even knowing who's operating on him. All he knows is that it's a fellow Autobot, and he's hearing all the things he was afraid of hearing. Being called a traitor, a monster, and a failure of an Autobot.
The secret medical lab is discovered by the Autobots, but not before the operation is finished. Pharma gets away, but Snapshot/Verator is left with the consequences of a body he didn't ask for. On Ratchet's medical berth, he begs for forgiveness. He doesn't want to go back, and he calls himself a bloodthirsty monster. But Prowl doesn't let him quit. He has to go back, and no he's not gonna find out who did this to Snapshot. Prowl suspects Snapshot is getting paranoid, and he doesn't want to cancel the infiltration project this far in.
Snapshot really doesn't like this. He resents Prowl for ignoring his cries for help, and hates him further for the lack of support. Angry and confused about what to do next, he takes matters into his own hands. Froid's gone MIA, but Snapshot knows where Trepan is. So he does what he does best now. Hunt. He finds and attacks Trepan, but is captured and arrested before he can actually kill him.
Soundwave is actually the one who ends up bailing him out. With his all-seeing optics and empath abilities, he always knew. He was just waiting for the right time to step in. Soundwave takes Snapshot to Megatron and effectively has him stand trial before him. It's revealed (to a very small group) that he was operating as an Autobot spy. But Verator boldly claims he no longer wants anything to do with them. He looks up at Megatron, his EMF radiating resentment.
"Look at what they have done to me and ask me again if I call myself one of them. They have done nothing but hurt me and left me without a purpose."
Megatron recognizes that hatred, and finds familiarity in the confused anger. He looks at him with a crooked grin and holds out a servo to the poor mech.
"Then join us instead."
So Verator does. He no longer has a purpose, so the Decepticons give him one. He becomes a double agent for the Decepticons, while Soundwave takes him in as a protege. He gifts Verator a piece of code, to truly make use of his little archival quirk. A code that takes everything he knows about everyone he's ever met, and runs it through a prediction algorithm. With this new ability, he becomes a goddamn tactical fiend. (elaborated on more in the link at the top)
Verator also ends up encountering Swindle, and they end up working together. Verator used to be a courier before the war, so he helps Swindle with delivering his "products" to customers. This job pays pretty well and Verator is able to buy a backpack mod that houses two different pairs of cables which he installs on his back to help him with dexterity, now that his hands are no longer what they used to be. There comes a day where Swindle celebrates a job well done with Verator, and he opens a nice bottle of engex to celebrate. Its main ingredient is distilled innermost energon.
Error warnings pop up across Verator's hud as the sparkhunter reawakens. He thought it was gone, that the empurata finally got rid of it, but in actuality it set the malicious code in stone. The sparkhunter would awaken whenever he was hungry or in danger, but after empurata his processor is now convinced he's always in danger. Now he's stuck drinking innermost, a very expensive and rare form of energon. But Swindle makes another deal with him as a form of apology.
He uh. He offers to pimp Verator out in exchange for providing him with innermost. Look man, he's got cable tentacles! I don't know what you expect from me! Verator of course takes the deal, not that he really has much of a choice. They work everything out and Verator becomes a very popular mech under the name "Toxic". Yes there is reason behind that name, it relates to how someone requests for his services. With all this money and a newfound addiction, Verator splurges on getting a fancy new mouth mod so he can better tap into that instinctual need to get a lil sippy.
Verator meets Tarn again around this time, and thing get… interesting between them. Tarn sees how the small meek warden from Grindcore has grown into a true beast of a mech. He has to have them for himself. Through manipulation and promising to keep Verator fed, he has this brutal weapon of war literally eating out of the palm of his servo. You see, Tarn can afford to keep Verator fed, with him being the leader of the DJD and all. Tarn also pushes Verator to get the heavy body mods that allow for whatever the fuck is going on in the sparkhunter alt mode. Except it's not a true alt mode, just a showcase of said mods and dozens of micro transformations. Tarn quite literally shapes the sparkhunter into being, through pressuring Verator to lean into more monstrous motifs and teaching him how to brutally kill others.
He also kinda pulls a Getaway/Tailgate with Verator. And almost completes the Conjunx Ritus with him. But Tarn holds off the final act of service and instead says Verator will know when that time comes, when Tarn asks for the one act that will prove his loyalty.
With everything that's going on with Verator, it's not a surprise he quickly rises through the Decepticon ranks. Shrouded in mystery, but a terrifying piece on the chessboard that only few are privy to knowing about. And yet, he can't help but to ask if this was the right path to walk on. But it's truly too late to turn back now.
And then the war ends.
Verator is stuck in the Kimia wreckage along with all of the other Decepticons, but he knows he can't stay on Cybertron. If he does, it's only a matter of time before the Autobots find out he's betrayed them, and how he's been stringing them along for millions of years. He hears about the Lost Light, an unaligned ship. Verator looks at where he's come from and finally asks himself if this is the life he's always wanted. He's about to finally face judgement and he's not ready yet. So with his Sparkhunter alt mode and Soundwave's blessing, he makes for the Lost Light and seeks the nostalgic comfort of an old friend.
