Good Eye, Sniper || On Perceptor
“When Perceptor and physics make eye contact, physics blinks first.” Getaway, Filling in the Blanks
He talks too much until he doesn’t talk enough, he’s almost too bright and for that, was almost once extinguished.
How does one go from a walking trivia machine to an ice cold gunner?
Let’s talk about Perceptor, The Least Warlike Autobot.
Originally, Perceptor was a security mech under Sentinel as well as a brilliant scientist- not exactly Oohrah Soldier Material, to be sure!
But his bright and chatty ways changed drastically after being pulled into a Pretender Project, the rebuild of one Kup. Within a short span of time, he went from being a leader in science and technology to nothing much more than a babysitter- the cigarette pack that kept Kup’s processor in line, and something of an IT service for the Wreckers.
He was tolerated, maybe even liked! Until, of course, that fateful mission on Turmoil’s battleship; Where, mid sentence, his chest was blasted through and he hit the ground, surely about to die.
And this is where the change from a chatterbox to a stone cold Sniproscope begins.
Part 1: The Technicalities of “Dying”
After this incident, Perceptor upgraded himself, going from merely a scientist to an ice cold sniper capable of taking out a combiner with a single shot to it’s torso (x). He becomes cold, distant, emotionally detached almost- And if you think about it, it stands to reason this would be the route he takes when faced with his innate personality.
Perceptor is passionate. Specifically about his work- a running gag through several continuities, including the G1 cartoon, is that he can lecture and speak and ramble about something he is truly interested in with almost no stopping- unless someone tells him to shut up.
Turmoil, the Decepticon who shot Perceptor through the spark, falls into that “tells him to shut up” category. In Spotlight: Drift, we see the moment Perceptor meets death- The moment Turmoil shoots him through the heavy doors he is trying to keep locked while the Wreckers try to slice through the wall for an extraction mission.
This moment, specifically. See what he says upon seeing the smoking hole in Perceptor’s body? “Shoot your mouth off, give your position away. Amateurs.”
And then, in the very next panel, a shot to Perceptor’s eye while he, apparently, screams in pain and probably terror. Now, judging by the angle of the shot, its not a clean one- what was no doubt intended as a quick end instead was most likely just added suffering, his spark beginning to slow and fail and fade and half his vision fritzed or worse- gone completely.
And then everyone left.
Now here is Perceptor, nearly dead and on the way out- his sight halved and fuzzy and his spark nearly obliterated. And at the end, he’s alone. The Wreckers moved on, attempting to finish the mission while battling Turmoil’s forces only to be separated briefly.
And then, he’s not alone, and he’s falling, and then he’s on the Trion in a CR chamber nearly in pieces.
Imagine how that affected him, when he came out of the CR chamber- a culmination of years upon years, no doubt, of being just a bit too wordy. It’s even reflected in MTMTE years later, when Rodimus (bored or agitated by Perceptor’s scientific terms, it’s hard to tell) cuts him off to tell him to use layman’s terms.
That aside, for Perceptor- he was nearly killed and then immediately mocked for his chatterbox tendencies. Speaking nearly got him killed, explaining was nearly the end of the line for him.
And when he comes out of the CR chamber, he changes- and not just physically.
He had already been a bit standoffish, no doubt at feeling a bit unwelcome among more active soldiers while being mostly a scientist, but now its cemented that not only is his BODY not up to par for war- but he himself is not either.
And we see, when he rebuilds himself, that his “explanations” are a single sentence, maybe less. Drift gets a “Much obliged” when Perceptor blankly quips that it was due to Drift that he is alive.
Nothing like the miniature lectures or chatter of before.
We see it when Monstructor is taken out by a single perfect shot to the joined-area of his torso, “Just doing my job.”
Operating on single sentences or less; the difference is astounding. But, considering everything that led up to it, not shocking.
The only deviation to this behavior (pre-Lost Light) is on Garrus 9, the prison planet Perceptor was requested to go to along with Kup, Springer, and several others.
The deviation of behavior, specifically, is the explanation of Aequitas’s function.
And this explanation is still rather short, and only at the behest of Verity. There’s no jargon, no tangents, to explanations within explanations or invitations for further discussion- its short, straight, and to the point. It’s blunt, clinical, and worded with a kind of finality that begs a conversation to move on away from the punctuation that threatens to fridge it.
But Perceptor’s initial near-death experience is not the ONLY factor in what his personality, what HE himself became- just the first step.
Part II: The Valley of the Shadow of Death
Near death experiences change you, it’s just a fact. There’s always a part of someone that gets left behind when healing from one, a little bit of their innocence or softness that is given up.
Perceptor is no different.
Perceptor always has been, and always will be, a scientist. He looks at things from a “logical” standpoint, he believes what his eyes show him.
And what his eyes showed him was being left behind, in more ways than one.
The first time being, of course, on Turmoil’s ship- no doubt it was assumed he wasn’t going to survive, not with an injury like that, not in a place like that- But he did. He made it back, because Drift pulled him out.
Looking over Perceptor’s Wrecker history, that would be the last time that someone did that it seems.
The first incident we’re going to look at is one that happens not long after Perceptor’s rebuild- Actually, immediately after taking down Monstructor.
One of the first direct reactions to Perceptor’s rebuild, not counting Kup’s discomfort and dismissal of Perceptor’s suggestion he rebuild into a soldier (not even specifically a SNIPER, just a soldier, just to have more survivability in wartime).
Blaster is hinted at being good friends with Perceptor; Primarily in Spotlight: Blaster, where Perceptor not only repairs Blaster after an assasination attempt gone awry, but helps him discover the assassin’s identity- Beachcomber, being mind-controlled by Bombshell.
Perceptor was injured when the trap had been set, and it looks to be a shot to the chest- Ironically, the same injury he repaired on Blaster, shown here:
Which was almost mirrored when Perceptor was shot by Turmoil.
And yet, Blaster’s reaction to Perceptor repairing and, in many ways IMPROVING, himself was to accuse him of “defiling himself”. To tell him his job was “a scientist”, considering Blaster’s job was once a radio host, that seems a mite hypocritical.
The second rejection to look at comes, also, from All Hail Megatron and the battle against the Swarm.
And here’s Ratchet, with an awful thing to say about someone you had a close working relationship with before they. You know. Nearly died and had to rebuild themselves from the ground up with frankly minimal support.
Acting like becoming capable of defending yourself and surviving a war somehow diminishes one’s intellectual capability.
And because Ratchet does nothing by half, he follows it up with something even WORSE. So, that is two people Perceptor considered friends who clearly... may not value the relationship as much as Perceptor might.
An important distinction, however, is while Blaster announced his opinion for the entire unit to hear- Ratchet’s comments were made in a more private setting, directly to Kup.
So, there’s that, at least.
But, these are just comments- rude, yes, but Perceptor has no doubt heard worse?
A fair point, to be sure! The problem comes in the form of Garrus 9. As many things do.
Gun-fondling battle-stat.
A special kind of derision, that- something that could be a reminder of what people really think of Perceptor. It makes one have to wonder- what would hearing another annoyed title being laid on him do? And by THE enemy, no less?
A reminder that his worth is entirely conditional. He is not necessary so much as convenient- He was convenient for Prowl, he was convenient for Kup, convenient for the Wreckers...
After long enough being optional, one stops trying to be irreplacable.
Part III: Old Gravemarkers
So, looking at the previous points, it’s safe to say that Perceptor isn’t in the greatest headspace at any given time. From the shot that killed an Insecticon scout and prompted Cliffjumper to ask “When did Perceptor become scary?” to his infamously showing activation of tactical explosives; its very safe to say that not all is well with our favorite science-sniper (as Verity once called him, in Last Stand of the Wreckers).
Down to the flat, cold way he voted in favor of killing Impactor, around to the almost clinical way he addressed crewmates in the beginning of MTMTE.
But, the most painful part is, he starts getting better. He begins to interact with others, mostly Brainstorm, and slowly seems to start shedding the frigidness he developed after his near death and his rebuild and after all the backs that got turned to him.
But then, Overlord comes back.
And it’s gently suggested that Overlord went looking for him, as illustrated below:
Could this be a reference to earlier in the issue, where Perceptor is seen carrying Tripodeca back after a terrible run in with the phase sixer?
Or is it something deeper than that- Overlord remembering Perceptor as the sniper that shot off his hand, that dared to go against him? Remembering Perceptor as one of the Autobots who set him up for absolute failure?
It’s entirely possible, and even plausible, that Perceptor internalized this incident (like many other things, no doubt) and it was one of the reasons Getaway felt he would be suitable to be involved in the mutiny. Perhaps this was a driving factor in seeing Perceptor spend a majority of time with Brainstorm.
Perhaps the behavior shown by Perceptor in MTMTE is the result of him simply forgetting how to interact with people- after so long in sniper perches and wondering if you’ll be dead in thirty seconds some things fall by the wayside, maybe socialization is one of them.
At the end, though, the things Perceptor later becomes known for: Being cold, distant, blunt and to the point even when using jargon, being almost uncompromising; after thinking about what he’s lived through, well....
It makes a little more sense, doesn’t it?
