Do you ever think about the uncanny valley? We might think we'd be instantly enamored with Cybertronians, like how we are when we see them in comics, movies, and shows, but considering how the uncanny valley works, Cybertronians look so human in the face that they'd trigger it. I'm pretty sure it would immediately provoke a fight, flight, or freeze response. (Yes, I know the fourth response exists, but I'm not adding that here.)
Just imagine:
Any Cybertronian (probably Beachcomber): "Hey Optimus, look at the new organic species I found!"
Random human: *Fearful, feral noises*
Optimus: "I believe we have scared them."
The moment we see them, it would either be a fight on sight or a run. Or we'd just stand there like a deer seeing an 18-wheeler at full speed.
Some of you, I know, would end up like this clip "Pet the human? More like the human is trying to actively destroy your servos." Just, "FREE ME, YOU METAL HEATHEN, I WILL NOT TOLERATE THIS!"
And then you'd have people who would be held like some rag doll that they have no idea what to do with because the human literally just stared at them as if they had ZERO survival instincts. But that's just a natural response, and they don't know that. Like this PERFECTLY NORMAL human is now just sticking with some of them because the Cybertronians (most likely the Autobots) would be adopting the human whether they want it or not. You're their human now.
Little thing based on a post from @earthsparked that gave me an idea :3
Jazz couldn't move. In all his years of combat, espionage, everything he'd done, for the first time he was completely and utterly frozen in place, but it wasn't out of fear.
Instead, he was crouched down, too scared to move as the tiniest being he's ever seen, they weren't even afraid of him. He wondered if that was because their creator was standing nearby.
"Are they... supposed to be this small?" Jazz asked, hearing the tiny human singing some made-up tune to themself as their little hands played with his.
"All children are that small," their parent nodded softly, laughing quietly at the shock on Jazz's face. "They grow up eventually, but that takes plenty of time."
"No time at all," Jazz murmured. He knew humans were a short-lived species compared to Cybertronians; they were already small compared to Cybertronians.
And now he learns that they start out so small, so defenseless, and yet... they're so brave. He couldn’t help but admire that as the small child tried to climb up his arm, giggling softly. His servo moved, ready to catch them at any moment.
Their biofield was so light and airy; it radiated happiness without any fear. This child had never seen war or combat, they had never seen anything that Jazz had. And Jazz couldn’t help but envy that.
Even still, he wanted to protect this little light. Innocence was bliss, and no child deserves to see war and combat at such a young age. Maybe this interaction with this small, short-lived being gave him some kind of hope. A hope for the possible future.
The first of four one-shots written as a thank-you to my followers! The most popular response on the poll was sparkbonding.
Optimus Prime & Reader • Prompt: Sparkbonding • Ao3 Link
I think that went as well as it could have, all things considered.
You sit down on Optimus’ front bumper with a sigh of relief, letting your cape settle warmly around your shoulders to guard against the chill of early winter. Nighttime in the desert is always colder than you think it should be, considering the scorching days. It feels strange to be dressed in a cape of all things. You spend most of your time around the mechs in civilian clothes. It’s only practical. More often than not, you’re covered in smears of engine oil, coolant, or – in dreadful situations – energon.
Tonight, you look like some kind of warrior poet or regnant monarch. The style and details of your outfit are human and familiar, but alien and novel at the same time. The subtle pattern on your gloves resembles the inner mesh of the Cybertronians. The lining of your cape is a perfect match for the deep red that's reserved, in their culture, for Primes. Meaning it's reserved for Optimus alone, now, and you haven’t called up the courage to ask him why he’s dressed you in it. Or why none of the other mechs have said a word of protest about him doing it.
Along with the ridiculous cape (which you kind of love, not gonna lie), is the sweeping flow of a skirt-train. It disguises your form from easy targeting. It’s also separated into pants that let you move quickly. Interior pockets hide a handful of very small weapons, undetectable by human screening systems. The bodice has a personal touch, picked out in delicate shimmering chips that catch the light against the black of your clothing. They mirror the stars that were in the sky the night you were born, and the constellations that shone above you the night the Autobots first arrived on Earth. Sentimental, you’d thought when you’d first tried it on, but they serve as a reminder of why you’re wearing it in the first place. The two worlds you’ve come to care for and represent.
The diamond chips are also part of a sensor-net, threaded on wires so micro-thin your eyes can’t see them. The sensor-net tracks your location and vitals, sending the data directly to Optimus’ monitoring subroutines. You’re still not sure how you feel about being tracked like that, but you’ve grudgingly given in to some precautions after the last attempt on your life.
The necklace around your throat with the large pendant is a kinetic barrier generator, shielding you head to toe from gunfire and shrapnel. You’d been less sanguine about that one, arguing about possible ricochet damage to bystanders, only to be out-voted by both your mechanoid and human colleagues. You had poked at it with a bent paper clip in the bathroom, only to get a warning shock you were fairly sure was intentional. (You were going to have a word with someone whose name rhymed with “Brainstorm.”)
All of this, for you. If you thought about it too long, it felt unreal.
You’d spent a lot of time staring at your image in the mirror before the summit, wondering if the “you” of five years ago could ever have imagined you’d be where you are, and who you are, today. Or how you would have felt if you’d known then, how much responsibility would come to rest squarely on your shoulders.
Amid your rumination, the leader of the Autobots echoes your sigh and your relief with a soft release of his air brakes. The big truck settles lower on his tires, apparently as glad as you are to finally be out of the hustle of the diplomatic summit. It’s become common for the two of you to squirrel yourselves away for an unofficial debrief after any serious events.
It went far better than I expected, or hoped. You were remarkable. Your speech affected many in attendance, and your conversations at the reception appear to have been fruitfully convincing.
You give a breathy little laugh and lean your head back, looking up at the velvetysky above the mesa.
I’ll take your word for it. I couldn’t see beyond the first row of faces because of the lights on the stage. And I’m sure I mispronounced a few names or outright forgot them, at the reception.
Perhaps, but I have already received confirmation from sixteen of the participants that they are willing to proceed. Another seven have reached out seeking private meetings to further discuss the proposal. I have only had two firm denials, and they were –
Let me guess. You name off the two you were pretty sure were never going to go for it no matter what anyone did or said, and were unsurprised when the Prime affirmed your suspicions.
They’ll either change their minds when they see what they’re missing out on, or do something rash to sabotage us. I’ll keep in touch with Fowler and Jazz’s team so we’re ahead of them, either way.
You raise your hand and gently rap your knuckles against his grill with a chiding cluck. Now, that’s enough work talk. It’s getting late. Ratchet will give me that look if I don’t make sure you get some rest. I know you haven’t fully recharged for the past three days, minimum.
I have been busy preparing for the summit, he protests, but you just give him a doubtful hum letting him know you aren’t going to say anything…but you both know you could. You settle in and let the crickets sing their song in a comfortable moment of peace.
Being outside of their chain of command so you could call Prime on his lack of self-care was one thing you’d insisted on back when you’d agreed to take the job of ambassador. Because along with that job had come another one that none of the other humans even knew about. Some strange title that didn’t translate well from Cybertronian, but was culturally important to them. Something like “Guardian” except not, because you knew Arcee, Ironhide, Bulkhead, and Bumblebee were Guardians to their human friends. Despite your rather ferocious appearance tonight, you definitely weren’t any front-line warrior or bodyguard like them.
The title also meant something like “High Protector,” which made even less sense, since you were as common a human as a human could be, not anything high or mighty. And while you’d protect Optimus with your life when it came down to it, the huge mech was a walking gun show with more firepower than most of the Autobots put together, let alone any weapons you could possibly wield. He’d only smiled at you when you’d said as much, and gently suggested that perhaps you were protecting him from other sorts of dangers. Dangers that affected the spark, and not the frame.
Whatever that meant. Even after all this time, you were still mysteries to each other in so many ways. It was a joyful thought, not a sad or upsetting one. You were a trusted friend to an alien species. You wanted to spend the rest of your life learning about them, being with them. Fuck making history, really. You were being selfish, finding something in your relationships with the Autobots that you’d always been searching for.
You feel a little guilty about it. Who are you to deserve such things?
Almost even more unexpected, was that the handful of other humans who’d befriended the mechs had come to look to you for advice. In emergencies, you were there to find solutions. You were a shoulder to cry on, a mediator when arguments came up. When someone new stumbled onto the mechs, you were the one to give them The Talk (Not That Talk, The Other One). You were the person who got the 3 a.m. phone call when someone woke up from a trauma-induced nightmare and needed a listening ear, because god knows getting a therapist through the six kinds of non-disclosure agreements you all had to sign was an even bigger nightmare.
It went the other way, too. You’d become the human first contact for most of the mechs now on-planet. You’d even managed to somehow, through quick thinking and some outrageous twists of fate, coax a few Decepticons into defecting to the Autobots. You had a quicksilver tongue, they said, able to argue the wings off a Seeker and the racing stripes off a speedster. More than that, you possessed a convincing honesty that just couldn’t be faked. People didn’t like disappointing you. You couldn’t really fathom why.
You’d never thought of yourself as a leader, just a problem-solver. A friend. But when the government had asked the Autobots who they wanted as their ambassador, rather than appointing a Cybertronian, they’d pointed at you. You’d looked around in a panic, thinking some of those servos were maybe directed at someone else. Only to jump when Ratchet had scoffed, scooped you up and deposited you in front of the Men In Black Who Were Not Fowler.
Maybe by then, working so closely together, it was inevitable that you and Optimus would become close.
It hadn’t started that way. He’d been kind, deeply so, when you’d first stumbled into their lives in a panic of twisted metal, bloody scrapes, adrenaline crashes and dissociation. He’d been kind, but somehow distant. Always watching with a faint smile from doorways as you and Bumblebee whistled short phrases back and forth. Observing as you gently pried answers from Ratchet, and eventually wore the medic down enough that he’d let you help him with medical care for their team. He lingered just outside the warmth that you came to share with the others, as if fearing he would get burned by it, or smother it out under the weight of responsibility he carried.
But then. Sometimes, as your eyes were glued to the screens when his soldiers deployed on a mission, you could feel his optics drift to you. Taking in your concerned expression, watching you worry for the safety of his people. Maybe that was when he’d begun to let down his guard enough to allow you to worry over him, too. (Someone needed to, you figured.)
Even so it had taken literal years, and some very difficult experiences, for the two of you to break down your own barriers. You, it turned out, weren’t really any more forthcoming than he was. Dealing with other people’s problems was far easier than dealing with your own. You were always holding your own problems and feelings inside, just like some mechs I could name, Ratchet had snapped at you more than once when you were being stubborn.
Yet like the slow dance of twin moons, you and the Prime had found a common orbit in a shared gravitational pull. You built trust over time. Sometimes you were forced to push your own boundaries in breathtaking moments, due to the war, but you can’t bring yourself to regret it. And you don’t think you could ever regret your friendship with him, even if it gets you killed someday.
These past few years have painted themselves on both of you like the stars paint the sky. Until you’ve come to this moment, quiet and peaceful, hard-earned and worth it all. Basking in each other’s presence, as best you can despite your respective differences.
It’s getting late, you weren’t kidding, but you know the Prime well enough to get a feeling there’s something he wants to say. You play with the edge of your cape, letting the silence linger. Eventually Optimus speaks up.
There is something I have been wanting to ask you, my friend.
Does this have anything to do with the argument you had with Ratchet, Elita, and First Aid the other day? you question, because while you don’t eavesdrop as a matter of course, their voices were loud and the base echoes. Gossip always gets back to you one way or another.
Yes. His tone turns wry. Ratchet believes I should have approached you about this already, and says that I am “making a mess of things like a sparkling in his second frame, afraid of his own shadow.” Elita called me “an old fuddy-duddy who can’t recognize a good thing, much less ask for it, if his very spark depends on it.”
He pauses and adds, First Aid actually answered my questions, thankfully.
Questions?
Yes. I needed to ask, because I do not know what the effects will be, nor even if it is possible. And I would not have you harmed.
That might be alarming coming from anyone else, but Optimus would never hurt you. Never. You frown slightly at the caution in his tone, and ease your way off his bumper. There’s a feeling in the air that makes you want to look him in the optics. Maybe it’s coming from him, or maybe it’s coming from you. You’re not supposed to be able to consciously feel their electromagnetic fields. But this close to him, sometimes you imagine there’s something more there than just the intuitive sense you get of his enormous mass and the heat of his inner workings.
You presumed correctly in any case, as he immediately transforms and sinks to a knee. An action that you’ve grown used to – except that tonight, combined with his words, the gesture kicks your heart into high gear. It’s never not at least a little amazing, seeing this enormous being to humble himself for the sake of connecting with others. Yet it’s always you who ends up feeling humbled and brought low.
You step closer until you can reach for him. Humans, so tactile. Always needing to touch or be touched, reassure or be reassured. He knows this. He extends a hand, and curls his fingers as you wrap your arms around them. You hold onto him like a perched red-winged blackbird dressed in stars and alien engineering.
You have become so very dear to us. To me. His vocalizer resets, and the brightness of his optics seems to go right through you. You don’t flinch, not anymore. He’s seen you at your worst, your lowest, and your best. He’s seen the worst and best of humanity, for that matter, and treated you with greater gentleness than you have for your own species. It’s one of the many things you love about him.
The words spill out from you as if unlocked from a gilded chest, that had only waited for permission to turn the key.
You mean so much to me, too. You’ve changed my life. You’ve changed me. You let me be someone I’m proud of becoming. You inspire me to want better for my people and yours too, and then you challenge me to make it happen. I’d like to think we’re truly making a difference, together. For everyone. Because of you.
His internals ping and whirr, like hot metal cooling. His optics are the bluest thing you’ve ever seen. He brings his other servo behind you, protectively cupping you as he strokes a single finger across your shoulders. He seems almost stunned.
…Ratchet was right, he murmurs, and you bark a laugh.
Isn’t he always?
He doesn’t laugh though, just tilts his head. Still looking at you in a way you can feel down to someplace even beyond your bones. Someplace in your soul, not that you’ve ever even been sure you have one.
I should have set aside my fear and done this long ago. He says it quietly enough that you’re not sure if he’s speaking to you, or himself.
Tonight, I ask you for something I have no right to seek, but which my spark wants nonetheless. You know that I am old, my friend. Older than your civilization. I have stood on the surface of countless planets. I have seen stars die. I have extinguished lives and brought them into being. I have failed and I have triumphed, I have been wronged and I have wronged others.
Now I live among an alien people I am proud to call my allies. I look to a future when, through your efforts, my own people can finally set aside the burdens of this war. I look upon you and your kind, and I see a chance to prevent the cycle of violence from continuing. To help others learn from our mistakes, and not repeat them. It is here on this planet, so far from the place I first opened my optics, that I have found a part of myself in you. Across the universe, I have found you. I would give you a part of myself, that recognizes it is already yours.
He murmurs your name. Will you allow me to attempt to sparkbond with you? I would keep you with me long after even my memory relays are rust, and my very essence has returned to the Well.
Your heart skips, your breathing halts enough that he blinks at the change in your vitals, still fed to him from the sensor-net. Before he can worry over you or worse, apologize, you tighten your hands on his servo, look him in the optic and say -
Yes. Oh please, yes. But what do I do? I don’t know how…this isn’t something Ratchet ever talked about. What does this mean?
His entire frame shifts, softening, and you realize how puffed-up his armor plating had become, how tense he was. How relaxed he has become at your answer – and how alert.
It is not often discussed openly. And I am not certain that it will work, he cautions, though the way he holds you like something precious is evidence of how much he wants it to work. I am not aware of anyone successfully attempting this kind of bond with an organic.
But humans -
Are often an exception to the rule, he finishes the common phrase you two have come to share.
He smiles more broadly, and scoops you up into his hands. You’ve never felt safer than you do right now, high atop the mesa with the clear sky above shining with the Milky Way, and crickets singing in the brush so far below.
You don’t ask if it will hurt, because you don’t care if it will. But you ask, Will it hurt you? Could it be used to hurt you?
No, and no. And after extensive research and observation, I can say with a 99.7 percent certainty that it will not harm you. I had Prowl calculate the data, factoring in extra redundancy.
Because of course he did.
As for what it means, he pauses.
It means what we wish it to mean. Sparkbonds are between friends, lovers, partners. We use words like amica and conjunx to describe it, but what it truly means is that my spark will always know you and embrace you. I will feel your field, more strongly than I do now. Perhaps even from a great distance. I may catch glimpses of your emotions. In some very strong bonds, bond-mates may even share thoughts, though I cannot say such is likely between us. They are rare, and even though I am fortunate to carry many sparkbonds, I do not share that level of bond with anyone, any longer.
You nod silently, your heart breaking for him as you grasp his meaning. You remember the cave-in during the spring floods, when the water had been rising and he’d been too weak from energon loss to dig you out. Your ankle was broken, your phone zapped by the energon crystals in the cave, and you weren’t sure if your call for help had gotten through. You had spoken of philosophy to distract one another as you waited for rescue. He’d told you then in half-slurred words of the old and dear friend who bravely fought against oppression, who had gone on to become his greatest enemy.
And then with his voice glitching into Cybertronian on every third word – he'd told you that you reminded him of that friend, that brother, once so close that they were as one. Your ferocious demand that the world change for the better. That you were not willing to settle for what is, in the face of what might be. Even if it meant dragging your own people into a different future with your own bare hands.
You know without asking who he’s talking about, now, when he says he does not have that type of rare sparkbond any longer. You glimpse what he had and lost. And yet he still wants to do this with you, if it’s even possible. His courage makes you feel ashamed.
Optimus shifts in the darkness. It is less certain what you will experience. I cannot make any promises. It may change something in you in a way that no human has ever known. Or, you may not feel anything. That is why it is a selfish thing I ask. It is why I hesitated so long. Sparkbonds are reciprocal in nature. Yet most likely it will be something I take for myself, not knowing what I can give in return. If anything.
The frustration in his voice is evident. You shush him, leaning in to place your hand on his smooth metal chest. You can feel and slightly hear his spark at this close range. But you’ve never actually seen any of their sparks. You’ve seen diagrams from Ratchet, yes, that look like colorful Etch-a-Sketch drawings if M.C. Escher had an Etch-A-Sketch that could draw in five dimensions and shrimp-exclusive colors. The diagrams had been accompanied by confusing terms about polarity and variance and some things that just didn’t have translations in any human language.
But you understand enough what a spark is. You understand that it’s him, in the purest sense, and you understand what he wants. You understand what it costs him to ask this of you, to be brave enough to be selfish for once in his long, long life. As always, he makes you want to rise past your own fears of inadequacy. You hold his gaze, not hiding the tears in your eyes.
I am still saying yes. And if you need to hear it a third time: yes. I am sure. I want this, Optimus. Even if I can’t have it, if we can’t have it, I want to know that we tried.
A small, chill breeze picks up and you both shiver, though you know he doesn’t feel the cold as you do. He ducks his head to his chest and shutters his optics. His hands cupping you shift slightly, his grip firmer, keeping you upright. Not restraining, but supporting. You feel one single shiver of fear that’s at least half anticipation.
You hear the sound of partial transformation. His chest opens, baring the spark chamber of the last Prime, the last Matrix-bearer, the hope of Autobots and Earth. A being too old for you to comprehend. A person wrapped in metal, whom you’ve come to love so much that labels and words don’t matter.
The light is there as if it’s always been waiting for you. It’s too bright, surely it will blind you, but there’s no pain. It’s not hot, not cold. Unlike with their other systems, there’s no ozone-lightning smell or tang of energon on your tongue. There should be a sound to something so powerful and eternal, but all you can hear is the blood rushing in your ears. Then you can’t hear anything at all.
You stretch out your hand to touch that light and it reaches back, a living thing that sinks painless fangs into every electro-conductive nerve in your body. In that moment, even though he warned you it was a (remote) possibility, you’re shocked to feel Optimus with you in your mind. He sees you. He sees the dark thoughts crawling worm-like, the doubts you carry and the fears both illogical and very real. I know, he says, this being who’s done this many times before. This powerful entity who is strong enough to choose to be gentle.
We are the same in any way that matters, he says, and brings you closer, pulls you deeper.
You see his own defenses, regrets, eons of pain and loss that have been catalyzed into an unbreakable determination. You see the timepiece precision of his unfathomable mind, one worked in quartz and programming that is more alien to you than would be the mind of a crocodile or octopus. Christ, he’s brilliant through and through. A scholar, a warrior, a peacemaker. Something that your heart wants to call a father but that rings in an entirely different word in his native language, with an entirely different context, divorced of anything like the blood-ties of humans.
Beyond that, there’s something more. Something threading through him that now traces like lightning, racing across the connection and into you. It sings of creation so powerfully that you feel it remaking some part of you even as you look upon it (as it looks upon you from fathoms and galaxies and millennia away, and for an eternal heartbeat, recognizes you).
This happens even as you witness Optimus discovering you. He wonders at the chaotic fingerpainted geodesic chaos of your organic being, haphazard and undesigned, singular and endangered. You, organic, walk on the bones of those who came before you. You have been shaped by forces he can define in scientific terms, but never fully know for himself.
He learns the intensity of every sensation and experience as felt by a creature with their nerves unprotected, their heart on their sleeve, their hope a thing wild and unbroken. Unbreakable. Small and fragile and delicate, but unwilling to shatter. Always reinventing yourselves, denying entropy, demanding existence even if you must kill for it. How could he not love you?
His spark surges forward, seizing your outstretched arms in arcs of energy. Embracing you-surrounding you-melding into you. It still doesn’t hurt, though it feels as if it should. It feels as if there should be some intense unbalance in your natures that would prevent this from happening. A metaphysical circuit breaker. But there’s not. Or if there is, someone’s slapped duct tape on the switch to keep it from flipping.
You lose words, letters and phonemes floating away until there is only meaning. Variance. Life to life. Connection to connection. Spark to – [UNDEFINED] Spark to – [UNDEFINED] Spark to –
You don’t remember having a body, so you will your sense of self to embrace him in return. You draw on some primordial instinct of how to do so. If you ever remember this thought, you will gasp out loud at the realization it was something we had and lost, there’s something buried deep that bleeds and claws and hungers and calls out mine, mine, MINE.
But there’s something else that soothes it to sleep, and you forget for now. You forget everything for a while.
It lasts forever and then it’s over. You look down and see Optimus’ chest plates closing, your body pressed close to him. You see the prismatic quantum threads that aren’t threads streaming from his spark. Some of them are faded or broken, one jaggedly cut. You know you’re seeing the sparkbonds he shares with others.
There’s something else still there. It feels Optimus-adjacent enough that it doesn’t quite frighten you. It’s curious and close and very far away all at the same time, and its many blind eyes linger on you like a breath of stardust. So soft and light, you barely feel it. You want to look up at it, chase after the unknown, but something tells you that you shouldn’t. Just this once.
Below, Optimus starts bolt upright, bouncing you carefully in his servos. You feel his distress as if it’s your own. Something’s going wrong. You’re a bit distracted as the many-eyes of [REDACTED] regard you fondly.
[SWEET AND WONDERFUL SPARKLINGS, ALWAYS REACHING FOR THE STARS. REMEMBER THE WAY HOME IS WITHIN YOU.]
It sends out a flicker of energy and gives you a little shove.
With hands of willpower, you grip the shining thread that leads you to Optimus. You pull yourself down to him, to your body clutched in his shaking servos. You come back to yourself with a loud gasp and a kick of your heart that makes you feel like you’ve fallen from a great height. Your ears work again. Optimus is calling your name in a sharp panic.
Point-three percent, huh? you wheeze. Let’s not tell Prowl.
The Prime vents a terrified gust of relief, blowing out scorching-hot air. His engine must have gone redline in a blink to generate that much heat, that fast. He securely grips you as he lets himself fall onto his back atop the mesa, still venting hard, rendered unable to speak beyond murmuring your name. He’s stroking you as if to make sure you’re still there, his thumb pressed against your back where he can feel your lungs expand with each breath.
You sprawl on his chest, resting over his spark, shielded from the night by his hands. You feel like half your brain’s been rewired, and you might be tasting colors right now. You’re pretty sure that the fucking Matrix got itself involved there for a second.
You’re less certain, but strongly suspect, that wasn’t the only anomaly. Something that reminded you of Optimus but most definitely was not Optimus, had hitched a ride just to get a good look at you. You know for a fact that Optimus saw the whole thing – he was right there, after all – and now he’s trying to decide if this qualifies as some kind of miracle. You have a feeling he’s going to be slipping more Primal red into your wardrobe. At least it looks good on you.
You can vaguely hear a rumble of voices arguing, but Optimus seems to be ignoring them. It slowly fades from your perception.
That, he says eventually, is not how sparkbonds typically happen. If you were wondering.
You bury your face against his armor and snort a laugh. You’ve both probably fried some wires or brain cells, or maybe you’re both just really happy, because he joins you in laughing. You’re exhausted. The laughter trails off into the deepest sleep you’ve had in years, dragging Optimus into recharge alongside you.
If he happens to end up tangled in one of your very human, organic, confusing and chaotic dreams along the way, where it’s skin and not metal that covers his spark, and the sunshine has never felt like this before –
If you happen to dream of walking beside him through gilded hallways of his youth, finding yourself tall enough to look him in the optic, conversing in a musical language you don’t speak but somehow understand –
It’s all right. You remember the way home.
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Author's Notes:
Once I chose Optimus for this prompt, I realized sparkbonding a Prime is probably gonna involve some STUFF.
I've never written sparkbonding before, and I'm still feeling my way through how it could work and what the effects might be, or if it's even possible between a mech and a human. This is just one take, maybe not even how I'll write it in other stories, and this definitely got away from me a bit. It felt important that there be a real connection between you and Optimus, hence the hints at a rather deep and involved relationship long before this one-shot happened. There's also definitely some vague Cybertronian cultural fuckery going on in the background that reader has to kind of guess at, which is intentional.
It may be a bit out there, but I hope it satisfies the itch for everyone who wanted this option in the poll!
I need to add a citation: I did not make up the concept of red or any other particular color being a color specifically associated with Primes! I am straight borrowing that from fanon! Unfortunately I have read mounds of fanfiction and I can’t remember where it originated, but if I find it I’ll add a source. It might be one of those things that began somewhere and evolved into a trope. It’s not practical to cite every trope you didn’t come up with yourself, but this one’s distinct enough that I wanted to note it.
PS: I intend this to be platonic, or perhaps just real fuckin' queer and undefinable in human relationship terms, but if someone wants to read it as romantic, I ain't mad about it. You do you babes <3
(Platonic!Transformers Prime x Green Lantern!Teenage Reader)
• Imagine you are a teenager who lives in Jasper, Nevada. A small town that can be considered in the middle of nowhere.
• You were riding your bicycle home from an after school club. You saw a bright light fly across the night sky. Initially you thought it was a shooting star but realized that it looked a little too close and too bright. Against your better judgement you decided to head in the direction the light went. Maybe you could assess the situation and then contact the police.
• When you got closer you saw the orange glow of fire in the distance. You stood up on your bike and pedaled harder.
• When you finally reached the site you saw what you can only describe as an alien spaceship. You were scared out of your mind. If aliens seemed to be real would this one be hostile? Or would it be just as sacred of you as you are of it?
• Just for protection you pulled out your pocket knife. It probably wasn't much to actually do something but in your mind it was better than nothing.
• You walked closer to the opening with careful steps. You kept your eyes open, looking at all possible angles of attack. Then you found the alien.
• It was humanoid in shape. The same size as an adult man. But his features were anything but human. He also wore some kind of green bodysuit with a symbol that looked like an hourglass-ish shape.
• Your eyes locked with his. You couldn't describe it but you just knew he meant no harm. He saw the knife and held his hands in the air.
• Your brain barely registered him speaking to you.
• He, with short breaths, managed to say he was not a threat and that he didn't have much time left. He asked you to take the lantern he had with him and run.
• "I believe you will be worthy. The ring will lead you to the answers you need. You must take the lantern with you." After the alien finished he took his final breath and then went still.
• Not a second later the ring on his finger glowed brightly and flew off his finger.
• "(Y/N) (L/N) Of Earth. You have the power to overcome great fear. Welcome to the Green Lantern Corps."
A few months flew by...
• You entered your sophomore/2nd year at Memorial High School. During summer break you have learned about your new powers that are granted by the Green Lantern power ring, the history of the Green Lantern Corps, the emotional spectrum (primarily will), and Oa.
• You also met the other Green Lanterns of Earth: Hal Jordan, John Stewert, Guy Gardner, Kyle Rayner, and Jessica Cruz. If there were any others you probably haven't met them yet.
• When the school year approached the others helped you come up with a schedule so that you can focus on your studies and still make a little bit of time for GL patrols (both on and off planet).
• During an off planet patrol you befriended a Star Sapphire named Elita-One. She was a cybertronian who was recruited due to her love for a male cybertronian named Optimus Prime. During a war on their home planet they got separated and she's been trying to reunite with him since but kept getting sidetracked by helping her fellow Autobots that have been scattered to the stars.
• You promised to keep an eye out for "Optimus Prime".
• Now you are standing in a supposedly abandoned missile silo, alongside your classmates and a toddler who skipped a few grades, while the leader of the Autobots introduces himself and his team all because you decided to respond to the reports of a high-speed chase involving two cars and a teenager on a motorcycle.
• You only had two things on your mind: "Should I tell the Autobots that I'm a Green Lantern?" and "How am I going to tell Optimus about Elita?"
(Also let's make Jack Darby Bruce Wayne's biological kid while we're at it. He fits the description: Blue eyes, dark hair, absent father? Seems like the perfect formula for Bruce Wayne to be the father.)
Have you ever thought about how Cybertronians would feel about how humans react to their own kind getting into space? They're a spacefaring race, so this stuff is common for them, but here are these little organic beings seeing space as a true wonder, cheering every time a mission is successful, and mourning when a mission isn't.
How would they feel when they learn about our failures? Sure, they've had their own, but seeing how humans constantly hold on to those memories, how they constantly try to honor people who were lost, and keeping those who were able to return close?
How would they feel about how life-changing missions like the Artemis II mission can be for our science when they already know how to colonize other planets?
How would they feel about us mourning the animals we first sent into space? How we gave sweet Laika the title of being the Patron Saint of One-Way Journeys? How would they feel about us being angry about how she was sent to die while they probably just used drones or something similar that they never grew attached to?
Artemis II has me feeling things. Well, it has been like that since I first watched the live stream when the crew launched, and then seeing the highlights of the crew and the flight just made me emotional, especially about the crater named Caroll. Though, the moment when the Nutella bottle flew by the camera had me dying. Also, if you somehow haven't yet, go check out some of the pictures that are finally coming in; they're beautiful.
Editing rq to add onto this, for the crater named Carroll (yes, I know technically it has to be allowed by the correct authority, but it will forever be Carroll), imagine the Cybertronians seeing how much humans love each other, so much that they would even name a crater on the moon after someone, as if to say, "I told you I'd give you the moon someday."
You know those headcanons that depict fabric as scarce on Cybertron? I love those, I love seeing how some of the characters would react to human clothing, either with amazement or envy.
But imagine Cybertronians with a human friend who has hobbies or a job (like my aunt) involving weaving, sewing, quilting, etc., and receiving random gifts from them, like, "Hey, I made a mistake with this blanket, do you want it?" Or something similar.
How would they feel just getting random blankets or their human friend trying to make a Cybertronian-sized scarf or something similar? Just something made specifically for them that they wouldn't be able to get on Cybertron, especially if it's made in their colors or their favorite colors.
Have you ever thought about how Cybertronians probably wouldn't realize just how short our lifespans are until their first human buddy dies?
They don't realize that we live for 70-90 years (with some reaching 100+), and they think, "I'm going to go off-planet for a brief amount of time!" They leave their human buddy behind, only to come back and find them so much older, learning that their "brief journey" was 20-50% of their entire lifespan.
Do you think some Cybertronians would try to spend more time with humans, even if they know it'll just hurt them in the end? Maybe others would try to stay distant from these organic beings, even if they act almost identically to some Cybertronians.
For the Cybertronians that stayed, how would they feel seeing their human buddy getting older? For us, it takes a good amount of time to start graying, but for them? It's almost sudden.
As if just yesterday their human buddy was always wanting to come on adventures with them, show them around Earth, and so much more, but now? Now they can't do all of that; they have to take things slow. And their Cybertronian buddy knows that their human is nearing the end of their life. Maybe they'd stay right there with them; maybe some would want to leave, not having to see their friend die after seeing so much death.
