shenanigans

part of learning digital art includes drawing shit really badly over and over, so what better but to practice with everyone’s favorite test dummies from idw2! can I draw any better on a drawing tablet? debatable. am I sharing it anyways? yes. go my scarabs

TF Fantasy AU: Magnus

Megatron may be an overconfident fool, but loose-lipped he is not. He resolutely refuses to answer any questions about his automata. The only thing of substance - if it may be called that - is that Provoke overheard him - along with anyone in a radius of forty meters - shout about it not being what he was promised.

And so you seat, with a pile of belongings, and sift through them in hopes of finding a clue. You’re not alone in this task: Kup has joined you, since he might spot something that reminds him of something. Perceptor, Highfire and Paragon are digging through things. 

Cyclonus hovers to the side, along with Shockwave.

“Hm, now that does look familiar,” Kup says, holding out something that to your eye looks like a cross between a very ugly, useless, silver  tea pot and a phylactery. The gem inside gleams with magical energy. “Remember the lich I told you about? The one who fell into a volcano? His phylactery looked a lot like this one.”

“You mean ugly?” you ask, still marvelling at just how unappealing the object is. 

Cyclonus steps closer and looks at it with a focused expression. “I’ve seen something that looked similar. You remember the lich that-” he hesitates “-the lich that Prima destroyed? He has this pendant with a gem inside that looked like this.”

“A phylactery,” Shockwave says. “A container for a lich’s soul. It makes sense - the hearthstones are made of precious gems, and so are phylacteries more often than not.” He lets out derisive snort. “Vanity.”

“Now that you mention it,” Highfire says, as she looks at the tea pot-like object, “it does look like it was made by the same person. Feels like it was enchanted by the same person too.”

“A pity we do not have those phylacteries,” Shockwave says in mournful sepulchral tones. “We could track their creator through them.”

You know what he’s talking about. This was Extempaxia’s favoured type of magic: divination. Except… Well, you certainly cannot do the tracking. This would require actually constructing a spell, rather than memorizing one and you don’t think you know about that. But you do know that it ought to be possible to track the creator just with this ugly tea-pot thing.

“I think we still have Extempaxia’s notes on scrying,” you say. “They might help.”

“Extempaxia…” Shockwave muses. “Now where did I hear that name?”

TF Fantasy AU: Provoke

You make an inventory of your weapons and armour. It’s looking better than expected but not ideal. Cyclonus’s erratic approach to maintaining the monastery meant that he actually took care of the metal stuff: the swords are in perfect order. Your armors are a different story - Paragon’s didn’t survive the fight with Exarchon. Grudge’s is mostly okay, save for one of the greeves. Gridlock’s needs to be banged into shape again. 

Your spare gambeson has long fallen prey to the moths and time. Then again, if you need armour the situation is already bad, so there’s that.

Highfire stands still for a moment, her hand extended. A staff raises through - or out - of the stone floor. Runes swirl around it until they sink into the metal. You think it’s metal. You’re honestly not sure what the thing is actually made of.

“All right,” you say. “We’re as good to go as we’ll ever get.”

But you don’t leave just yet. You turn around to look at the monastery one final time.

You don’t know if you’ll come back. There’s no Order of Prima’s Blade anymore. Maybe you could start it anew. Once this is over, if you survive. It was a good monastery back in the day. But maybe it’s time to move on. Leave this place to history and find something new.

You close your eyes. You remember the monastery as it once was. You remember Prima with her dark braid and a tongue as sharp as her sword. Cyclonus’s sister, Armada, who barely ever spoke. Cyberwarp and Skyjack - who’d come from the far frozen North and told tales of a never-ending days and nights. Riotgear, who was so big, you all suspected he had a giant somewhere in his ancestry. (Trust a human to fuck a myth.) And all the others. 

You open your eyes again. Well, unlike you, they all managed to do what they meant to do. If you ever want to see them again - hopefully not in a long time, though - you better get this whole business sorted out once and for good.

“It’s high time someone got stabbed,” you finish.

Minor sketch/doodle dump while I work on stuff/juggle school. May or may not clean some of these up for actual pieces, but most of them will probably just remain sketchbook dregs.

As you can see there are a few specific fellas on my mind

an introspective femme with a fascinating with phycology and would probably have been a therapist if circumstances where different. has strong ideals and concerns herself greatly with the health of those around her.

Outlier ability: ghost walk - allows her to go into an incorporeal state, where she is invisible and can phase though solid objects

IDW 2019 issues 17 - 25

boy was that a lot of issues without him!

• Cyclonus has perched himself on the lip of the memorial crater, watching crew clear the debris.
• Highfire openly acknowledging they’re mental constructs by feeling out Cyclonus’ emotions (angry, seething)
• Cyclonus doesn’t appear angry, he looks very… bitter is the word I’d choose. Morose, even.
• Just a me thing but I headcanon he doesn’t facially emote much. Or hasn’t done so in a long time. No need to.
• Highfire does this in response to Gridlock remarking “What a mess…” and she asks what he means, which implies while they can all technically read Cyclonus’ mind, they can’t read each others’
• His whole vigil was watching over the memorial and keeping it safe, so on top of anger, he’s probably feeling a lot of Something at himself that he failed to clock people building a base beneath it, and preventing it from being blown up.
• To be elaborated on much later, but an attack on the memorial is an attack on him. And all the war’s other victims.
• Grudge, like Gridlock earlier, questions if anyone but Cyclonus cares about memory, let alone the memorial, but with a gentler approach. As if his belief is shaken but wants to be wrong.
• I imagine Cyclonus having an issue with “being talked about like he isn’t there, by people who ACTUALLY aren’t there” is not a new thing, but seems he hasn’t voiced a complaint about it in a while.
• “[…] Isn’t you talking about yourself as if you weren’t here the whole point?” responds Grudge.
• Wording choice tripping me up aside, I think this is just an acknowledgement that they exist as a way to semi-externalize Cyclonus’ emotions and thoughts. Where they are the ones who debate and he just sits there. Different facets of himself in the guises of his friends who work through his problems. A way to distance himself from the processing or lack thereof.
• Clearly based on Froid’s reassertion, Highfire brings up adding Paragon to the group. This is unpopular, but she brings up something discussed in Froid’s sessions. It’s not a direct quote but I think the concept of “hurt dissolving anger and guilt” had subconsciously stuck with Cyclonus no matter how hard he consciously pushed the notion away.
• Of course, seeing Froid meant the chorus were present for that so they “remember” what the two talked about.
• I like to imagine Froid compiling his own analyses on each hallucination by talking to them via Cyclonus as their interpreter, basically.
• Provoke says he should kill a man.
• Hilarity of vaguely stating “maybe killing someone would help” aside, Provoke was implying fighting against the Rise. Look at what they’ve done. What else they might do. Obviously fueled by desire to avenge the memorial, but she very notably expresses concern for others, the potential for future disasters. Out of making the proposed crusade more noble, more justifiable? Simply an additional motivation?
• Of course, she is the one who promoted the vigil to make sure Exarchon was dead and gone. Preventing a disaster like him, his war, or anything in the same ballpark is already something she was all in for.
• But she says this all in response to a conversation about improving Cyclonus’ mood/emotional well-being. It’s still selfish. Something that could be noble, flippantly suggested because it may have a positive outcome for oneself. It’s convenient. Vengeance, saving others, giving himself peace of mind, all with one action: killing “someone”.
• I think it’s important that while the Rise is a group, Provoke specifically refers to an individual in the abstract. The mind can grasp a single person being at fault a lot easier than a group, which is what I think is going on here.
• But who is the “someone”? The leader? The one who ordered the detonation? Flamewar? Shadow Striker? Any Rise member?
• Goes without saying that is a scarily vague and violent suggestion. She meant the Rise but I can’t express how bad it is she decided to only say “someone” and then not actually say “the Rise”
• Like an intrusive thought with some backtracking to justify thinking about it in the first place.
• She says that Cyclonus has, basically, moved on from “moving on” (accepted he’s in a metaphorical purgatory) and suggests he take it out on Hot Spot.
• Cyclonus casually, and out loud, tells Provoke no. Hot Spot does hear this but Cyclonus completely brushes past it. They (Cyclonus and pals) have been through this song and dance before.
• Might be reading into it too much but it seems like Cyclonus has been up here for a while. Not super long, maybe an hour or two. The fact Hot Spot has just now come up to shoo him away makes me wonder if, knowing how important the memorial was to him, the crew let him stay as long as they could allow before getting caught and/or getting orders to reinforce the cordoning.
• That or they only just noticed him, but I doubt it.
• The way Cyclonus passively gets up without a word in edgewise. Just an “okay”.
• Learned not to fight when authority tells him to move or (not) do something? Simply defeated because there’s no memorial for him to watch anymore? Just doesn’t want to fight?
• I personally believe he has the right to at least argue he should be allowed to stay and watch, at the very least from a farther distance, so it says something that he doesn’t even try.
• Hot Spot just kind of… watches Cyclonus trudge off. With a sort of softness in the eyes. Maybe pity. Has the energy of a “loiterer” (read: likely mentally ill homeless person) being escorted out of a public place (because they’re “making everyone uncomfortable” with their existence), by someone who doesn’t want to be doing that to them. I think Hot Spot knows very well why Cyclonus is there and only asks him to go because he has to.
• Where does Cyclonus live. Where did he live before this, cause it’s not in the city. He needed to maintain a sieve to have his energon. Did the explosion wreck his place? Is he fucking homeless now? WHERE IS HE LIVING NOW?
• Does Cybertron have homeless shelters?? I don’t doubt they do, but there’s no way in fuck he’s staying at one unless he’s forced to.
• Cyclonus, as what seems to be the norm for him and his chorus, falls to Provoke’s suggestion. Or is at least considering it. Learning that Sixshot was the one who ordered the memorial destroyed has made Sixshot that “someone” she was talking about.
• Considers murder before considering adding Paragon to the chorus.
• The fact Highfire brought it up means it’s on his mind though!
• Cyclonus is gone for several issues and then comes back only to be told to go away and then he leaves for the rest of the issue.
• That’s SO fucking FUNNY.
• He’s onscreen for 2-3 panels and he makes main players page???
• bro why are you silver. this isn’t IDW 2005
• Last time, Cyclonus had to be set on fire to be bothered going into the city. It’s a pretty big step that he entered of his own volition, during an almost-riot, no less.
• He’s on a mission, after all. He’s gonna have to jump some hurdles if he wants to accomplish it.
• The way this was one of the worst possible times for Cyclonus to show up gives me, local ADHD haver, the inkling he sat on the idea for too long and gave in a little too late, thus inconveniencing everyone including himself.
• You think he even noticed? He’s like “yeah, the city is always loud and obnoxious and full of angry people, everything checks out”
• Walks up to Prowl actively keeping someone back to ask if he can talk to Chromia like DUDE. THEY’RE ALL BUSY.
• I just think that’s the level of social ineptitude he’s at now. Big same, big guy.
• The fact he’s gone this far to learn more about Sixshot shows he’s all in on Provoke’s line of action.
• That, or he’s just trying to confirm Sixshot destroyed the memorial before he goes all in on hunting him down, since that was a rumor Hot Shot heard.
• “Go be crazy somewhere else, Cyclonus. Right now.”
• uh ok fuck you
• Is Cyclonus known around Iacon like the Leatherman or does Prowl just know about him from Chromia?
• I’d ask if she talks disparagingly about him with others but I know Prowl came to this conclusion on his own.
• Also I trust she’s only bothered by Cyclonus at worst, since talking to him (read: getting information) must be like pulling teeth. She talks about him neutrally with Windblade, if that’s anything to go by.
• Cyclonus was definitely walking over to the Senate with a single-minded purpose, paying NO attention to his surroundings because not even the chorus knows what’s going on. If he’s anything like me, he had his head down the whole way there.
• Grudge is nostalgic for the unrest. Because it’s familiar.
• Cyclonus doesn’t want a fight.
• Inevitably, no matter how hard he tries not to get involved, it WILL be made his fight. Provoke alludes to this with wryness.
• she’s such a bad bitch tho

i / ii / iii / iv / v / vi / vii

Oh look, extremely self indulgent pictures of the gang at Cyclonus and Paragon’s wedding! This was definitely not just an excuse to draw some vague formalwear.

Also the married couple in question. Awww. So cute. Nothing bad will happen to them ever (I’m serious about this, I refuse to make this angsty, canon has treated Cyclonus harshly enough, he gets to be happily married and grow old with Paragon sorry I don’t make the rules)

Just a boy and his dragon

HELLO MY NAME IS SLUSH AND MY SPECIAL INTREST IS BIOLOGY. I WANT TO SHOW PART OF MY NOTES ABOUT VERN AND WHY HE (probably) LOOKS LIKE THAT

He was probably evolved as an aquatic hunter, based off the little details we have about him. Hes comfortable underwater, disengages from it easily, and has Webbed feet. In his official art he DOES have something that looks like fur on his head. This is probably a course and oil less hair running down the length of his spine. It would act as a ballest to keep him comfortably under water.

Smaller and webbed hind legs for better swimming capabilities

Brighter colors? Maybe dragons have sexual dimorphism the same way birds do!

Feelers or whiskers to better senes prey in the dark waters. Horns would have been for display/mating purposes

Dragons more than likely evolved to hunt creatures that don’t exist anymore. Fast moving pray small pray

Long inward pointed teeth to better catch fish / Diastema tooth gap, evolved in animals that hunt fish smaller than themselves

Long oar like tail for better propulsion under the water

: )

Thats all, thank you

Daily female Transformers

Highfire! While the audience never sees her true personality, she expresses concern for her friend.

She was introduced in the 2019 IDW series and hasn’t appeared anywhere else.

I would love her backstory with all her friends and how they came to form their squad!

“Vern was feeling all mentor-like.”

Quote randomly pulled from page 365 of Eoin Colfer’s Highfire.

Quote was selected at random from a book chosen at random from my local library.

I’m currently reading Highfire by Eoin Colfer and I fucking love it?

I’m only like 70-80 pages in but it’s very entertaining.

I would read more books with dragons in them if they were like this. Urban fantasy with dragons seems cool.

Dear two-weeks-later @nimblermortal:

Highfire is by the Artemis Fowl guy, Eoin Colfer, and has a lot of the Artemis series hallmarks (humour, curmudgeons) but with a few more adult characters. The title character is a cranky centuries-old dragon who drinks slightly too much and deeply cherishes his Riverdance T-shirts - strong bachelor uncle energy.

The action kicks off when Squib Moreau, a burnout 15-year-old, finds his hiding place in the middle of the swamp and has to help fend off a sociopathic cop to keep the whole thing under wraps.

The whole thing is a lot of fun, with my only complaint being some overreliance on character archetypes.

The audiobook is read by Johnny Heller, who takes his job as a one-man play actor extremely seriously. He’s got a great sense of place in a way I very rarely get in an audiobook (the book is set in the Louisiana bayou) and does a fantastic job of characterization. He’s won 4 Audies, though he wasn’t nominated for Highfire that I can find.

I’m too tired to write this as a proper fic, but just imagine the scene: Mulch Diggums’ last bubbles propel him above the surface of the swamp, and he lands on Boar Island. Vern hears the commotion and comes out to see what the hell is going on, and finds an honest to god fucking dwarf buttoning up his bumflap. Mulch knew Vern would be there, of course, because Artemis mentioned it one time, and the dwarf just had to have a stickybeak. So there’s Vern, taking a breath to roast the fuck out of this weirdass creature from the swamp, and Mulch just goes, ‘Vern, buddy, looking well.’

‎Connecting to Apple Books

Book rec for the masses!!

Highfire by Eoin Colfer

He wrote the Artemis Fowl series, a standout to my young self bc it was edgy and smart for a kids series.

Another of his books (a YA sci-fi I think) taught me the word “cellophane” which for some reason is an intensely vivid memory to this day.

The cover was highlighter blue tones, rendered in a way that felt shiny. I was in my first bed, my only bottom bunk bed frame until my current which I bought at 25. The mental image is a figure in a laboratory setting everything lit highlighter blue, they’re on a treadmill or something like one, and part of them is covered in a clear plastic. Cellophane.

Highfire is also edgy and smart and just read it look it up get the audiobook I linked if ur like me and have trouble focusing on reading print books idc torrent it I just think it’s damn good

“Highfire” - Nicolas Cage Playing a Dragon in “True Detective Meets Swamp Thing” Series

“The genre-bending, live-action series Highfire is a gritty crime-thriller with doses of magical realism. Its central character, Highfire (Cage) is a vodka-drinking, Flashdance-loving dragon who lives an isolated existence in the bayous of Louisiana.”

#teapot #2021 #highfire #ceramics
#hsuceramicslab #modernart #homedecor #funtionalart #morrisgravesmuseumofart
https://www.instagram.com/p/CbwlyJOuPE_/?utm_medium=tumblr

#newwork #ceramics #pottery #highfire #clayart #coffeecup #vases #planters #cookiejar #forsale
https://www.instagram.com/p/CarN9strY5m/?utm_medium=tumblr

women in tf - Lightbright, Lancer, Lodestar, Provoke, & Highfire in transformers(2019) #17

bonus: tiny external shot of lodestar (vehicle mode ^-^)

women in tf - Provoke, Highfire, Greenlight, and Elita-1 in transformers(2019) #7

bonus: flamewar’s first appearance! tiny girl.