Cybertron was not without its fauna, Duskwalker learned, as she stumbled upon a group of petrorabbits playing outside of a ruin at the outskirts of Vos. She’d quickly lowered her frame, keeping her weight on her hind legs so as to soften her paw steps further, and tucked herself into a crevice where she could watch the creatures. They hadn’t heard, or scented, her for which Duskwalker was thrilled, but she didn’t dare transform to take notes or images for fear of spooking them.
They would hop or run a short distance, either to find a better spot to feed or just for the sake of play, then stand up on their hind legs and look around themselves. Long ears swiveled on their heads to listen for predators and Duskwalker could hear them puffing air in and out of their vents to catch a dangerous scent. Their colors ranged from a dark, gun metal, grey to dingy silvers that allowed them to blend in with their surroundings. It was interesting to watch them stop moving and seem to vanish among the planet’s surface.
Duskwalker was strongly reminded of other species in the universe while she watched them move about themselves, feeding, playing, or just lazing around, and she realized that those planets she had visited where she’d seen similar species were actually younger than Cybertron. So really those creatures were like echoes of these, weren’t they? Mechanical life taking shape in organic. One more idiosyncrasy to add to her growing list that Duskwalker had; that she compared younger life to the older life here on her home planet.
Movement caught her attention and Duskwalker adjusted her optics to pick up on a form that blended in with the debris it was perched on. Long limbed, supple, and with a tail so reminiscent of hers Duskwalker felt shock radiate from her spark. It’s yellow optics were fixed on the petrorabbits that had all gone still. The majority of them were on their hind legs, puffs of air being pushed through their vents so fast Duskwalker almost couldn’t distinguish which one was checking for scent. Their ears swiveled and moved at a faster rate; they knew something was up, the cat-like creature had somehow given itself away.
Scent wafted past Duskwalker and she realized not just how it’d failed, but what it was; a very young pneuma-lion. It’d gotten, essentially, upwind of its prey and failed to hide itself properly. Before it could even leap from its hiding spot the petrorabbits bolted towards their dens and any cracks too big for the pneuma-lion to reach them through.
Despite the sheer foolishness of it the pneuma-lion jumped out and chased a few of the slower petrorabbits, swiping its paw into the holes they vanished into, or pawing at cracks they’d squeezed through. Duskwalker tipped her head to the side and couldn’t keep from chuffing in laughter. The sound caught the attention of the pneuma-lion and Duskwalker soon found herself being searched out by another predator.
She wasn’t concerned. It was smaller then she was and Duskwalker was down-wind, but curiosity was something she shared with her choice in alt mode. Slipping out of her energon container’s straps and slinking from her hiding spot Duskwalker made a chirping noise meant to convey friendliness, kind-of like a greeting. The pneuma lion lifted its head and growled, confused Duskwalker thought, by her form. While they shared the majority of their attributes in common Duskwalker’s alt mode was not inspired by native fauna on Cybertron, but an alien species from a jungle planet.
Duskwalker hopped a little, lowering her front half and chirping again. Holding her tail high she waggled it back and forth trying to act non-threatening; after all it didn’t know she wasn’t after its territory. The pneuma-lion chuffed, circling her so that it could catch her scent, and froze. Confusion was evident as it lifted and lowered its tail, huffing air through its intakes, and trying to understand her. Duskwalker let her jaw drop open and chirped again, elongating the sound this time, and letting her rear end flop to the ground. She rolled over once and then scooted towards the pneuma-lion and reached a paw out to pat at its face.
Instantly the pnuema-lion was on top of her, growling in mock-aggression as the invitation for play was accepted. Duskwalker gave a high-pitch, not quite, mewling sound and rolled away from the flailing paws. She jumped up onto all fours and hopped away, lowering her front end to wait for the lion to come after her. It did, bounding and pouncing on top of her, but Duskwalker jumped away, trotting around in a circle. She pounced, landing short, and gently swatted the lion on the top of its head.
Grunting and shaking its head the lion rushed forward, pouncing on top of Duskwalker and together they rolled around play fighting. Duskwalker was ecstatic; she’d never been able to interact with the creatures on organic planets this way without fear of hurting them. Even though she was quite small for a Cybertronian, to them she was a giant. Nearly five feet at the shoulder in her feline form she could easily damage an organic feline of the species she imitated. It was a special treat, then, for her to interact with a creature from her own home planet.
Duskwalker took off at a run and the pneuma-lion followed after her. They raced, back and forth, but Duskwalker didn’t move too far away from where she’d seen the petrorabbits simply because she dare not lose track of where she’d stashed her energon container. One such trip back and the lion suddenly darted ahead. Duskwalker had barely turned her head before she heard a high pitched squeal and a crunching sound.
The lion had caught one of the rabbits. It dangled from its jaws, dripping energon, and the lion now growled at her. No longer welcoming her company, it had caught the meal it’d been after earlier. Duskwalker just lowered her head submissively; she had no intention of stealing his kill, had no need, and simply walked around him to where she had hidden her energon container.
Climbing up into the ruble Duskwalker could hear the crunching, slurping, of the pneuma-lion as it fed. She’d seen organics feed on prey species before, but this was a slightly more gruesome experience for her. Not that she thought it disgusting, or terrible, just a reminder that even Cybertron had its harsh realities. It was no different than other planets in the universe in these regards, but at the same time it was fascinating for her.
Cybertronians, like herself, mined energon from natural resources and refined it. They had no need to hunt or kill others for their fuel. Creatures like the pneuma-lion, turbo foxes, and other predators were required to hunt, catch, and kill their prey to obtain the energon and metals they needed for their systems. Their prey items gathered it from naturally occurring sources and so it was not so different from the relationship herbivores and carnivores among organic species shared.
The twist, for Duskwalker, came again when comparing the two: Cybertron was possibly the oldest planet in existence, though no one knew for sure, so Cybertronian life was not like Organic life, but Organic was like Cybertronian. The thought, and knowledge, of this made her wonder why organic life had taken after Cybertronian life. She’d seen images of alien life forms, and met some, who shared features in common with her people, but they were not out right created from a source like Primus. They, in fact, evolved to exist as they do. Was this a by-product of their species? Had Autobots, Decepticons, and Neutrals influenced the evolution of organic races?
Intrigued Duskwalker transformed and pulled out her data-pad. She couldn’t think too much about the subject right that second, but she figured she’d have time later to ponder it. Though it wasn’t her area of study Duskwalker’s fatal flaw was her curiosity. If she questioned it and it was interesting to her she couldn’t help but to look into it. A time or two that curiosity had gotten her into a bit of trouble that, thankfully, Renegade had gotten her out of. Now that she was more on her own she’d had to learn to curb her curious nature.
After making a few notes for herself and uploading an image of the pneuma-lion Duskwalker returned her datapad to her subspace and transformed again, shrugging into the harness of her energon container. She could no longer hear the lion, most likely it had returned to hunting, and she thought it was rather sad they hadn’t been able to play longer.
You, she thought to herself, are a few components short of a processor if you find it more entertaining to play with a wild creature than spend time with your own people.
Or maybe she was not so odd. After all a pnuema-lion hunts what it needs to live and kills to protect hunting territory. It doesn’t kill someone simply because they said something the pneuma-lion didn’t like, but that was a philosophical question Duskwalker knew would only give her a processor ache. So instead of troubling herself over it she continued on her way, sniffing the air to keep track of whether she was the object of prey in another’s hunt. There were larger pneuma-lions out there, and even larger predators lurking in the dark spaces, she couldn’t travel blind to the dangers.
Sometime back I was looking for pictures of petrorabbits but there aren't really any? So I thought it would be fun to try and come up with one: I started with references we've seen of turbofoxes in mtmte and RiD for a general idea of what they might look like and came up with these doodles. Not great but it was fun to play at.
