Created a new set of armor, heavily inspired by classical roman Lorica Musculata, as well as finally getting around to finishing that Blood Legion Scutum shield i said i was going to make like 7 months ago. I’ve noticed that on a lot of my previous armor designs, the eyes have always been horribly exposed, and vulnerable to just about anything. With this helmet, i’m attempting to fix that issue, with proper eye slits, punched in to the plate, instead of constructing a helmet around the eyes, as in many, if not all of my other armors. This is the kind of armor I could see the Blood Legion using, since they have always been the most reminiscent of the Roman military to me.

Oh, and by the way, this armor is also free for use in commissions as a Blood Legion Standard Armor.

In the process of making this, i found out a few more things about charr that are going to help me in making armor in the future. You see, their torsos are really quite wide and stubby, too much so for me to be able to make a proper Lorica Musculata style breastplate, and keep the shoulders free of the hips. There is too much movement in the back for the entire breastplate to rest solely on the waist, and since their torsos are wider, the distance the breastplate would travel when the torso pivots forward, backwards, or to the side is a lot greater than on humans. I’ve been experimenting with this particular design choice on multiple sets of armor, namely on the armor i made for Ivana, and the new set of Ash Legion armor i made, and that is this sort of proprietary Plackart that rests on the waist, underneath the upper breastplate, as opposed to just being a part of the breastplate, like a normal plackart. This allows for the upper breastplate to move with the shoulders, which is very important for the charr, because of how their shoulders are placed, and allows the legs to move, because on a normal breastplate, the plate would come down to much and not move away from the torso, preventing the legs from traversing up high enough to remain mobile. Granted, this does create a very vulnerable area between the upper breastplate, and the plackart, but i’ve also found out that the way the charr stand, creates a lot of distance between their head, which is the primary target, and the torso, which is one of the most important parts of the body to protect. Charr have a very long reach, and in combination with a shield, and formation of other charr on the sides, they probably don’t even need torso armor, just because of how much it gets in the way for charr. I’ve also found that the neck is not as vulnerable than i once thought, especially if the charr in quiestion is fighting alongside allies. They can simply move their head left or right to block strikes aimed for their neck using their helmet if they need to.

Vesalius, AKA Nati

(warnings: mentions of medical things, all consensual and distress-free)

At some point during the Golden Age, a professor at a college of medicine decided that they needed a better example for the medics-in-training to work on. Cybertronian medical schools have ‘models’, of course- cold-constructed frames, without real sparks, with only the equivalent of a brainstem for a processor. Their systems function more or less normally thanks to a simple power source in the spark chamber to keep energy circulating properly, but they are not, and never will be, living things. The only issue is, they aren’t alive. They very clearly aren’t alive. They don’t move much, even with provocation. They can’t tell you if they’re in pain, they don’t have EM fields, they don’t feel like living things to a Cybertronian past an initial glance. A good start, but no substitute for a living subject.

Fortunately, this professor had morals, and didn’t want said subject to suffer. He did, however, think that the only solution to this problem of the subjects not being alive is to get a live one. Given the specifications needed, an MTO.

Enter- well, their name isn’t really Vesalius. Andreas Vesalius was a 16th-century Flemish anatomist, often considered the father of the study of human anatomy. There’s a Cybertronian equivalent, whose name is unpronounceable by human tongues, and that’s actually Nati’s name. Everyone calls them... call it the equivalent of Nati. Sort of a mangling-slash-shortening of “anatomy”. 

Nati is partially transparent. Their plating is a sort of metal-and-plastics alloy, shot through with thin metal wires for conductivity. It’s weaker than standard armor, but it works fine for Nati, and is almost perfectly transparent. The clarity varies depending on the angle and the lighting. About 90% of their plating is transparent, save some of the plating around their pelvis, so they aren’t constantly flashing everyone. Much of their protoform and muscle cable material is a slightly modified version of the standard- just as strong and flexible as it should be, but changed to have no pigment, and with its fibers aligned neatly for clarity. 

Viewed from the front, their wiring and veins are normal, but they have a lot of redundancies in both systems. Mostly tucked away behind and around the sides of their organs, so that repairing them goes as normal. That keeps them safe and comfortable, keeps their organs functioning properly, even with lines cut through. That way, they can be injured for someone to practice, without risking damage to an organ. Many major lines are rigged in such a way that they can be easily replaced when they’ve been repaired too often.

Oh, and, for obvious reasons, they can’t feel pain. Or, it would be closer to the truth to say that they can’t feel hurt. Their nerves feel pain signals just fine, and they’re processed differently than regular touch signals, but their processor lacks the bit of a normal processor that interprets pain as hurting. They’re aware if something is painful, aware of what would be considered severe pain for others, but feel no distress from any level of pain. And, as an MTO, they were set up to be calm-natured. 

The result? A bot who looks a lot like those clear-skinned anatomy models you see sometimes. Minimal bio-lighting, but they glow lightly due to the energon in their lines. In ambient lighting, things are a bit blurry, but it’s easier to see if they’re lying down with a bright light over them. Most of their major organs are fairly easily visible, even the outside of their spark chamber. The portions of their chamber that can be seen anywhere other than surgery are hidden by just about the only other non-transparent armor on their frame, aside from pelvic plating and some of their helm plating. Preserve their decency and avoid scandalizing others and whatnot. Everywhere else on their plating, muscle cables, and protoform, servo to pede to face, is see-through. Some of their helm plating can be lifted away with ease, revealing a clear casing over their processor, which is studded with tiny lights. The lights, when their helm plating is removed, flash to show patterns of processor activity. 

They also have an emergency measure. The lessons never put them in any true danger, but they did occasionally get to a point of needing a sort of shelter. Namely, a set of wires and energon lines, connected to a small reservoir of energon. If their energon levels get too low, their systems shunt all remaining energon into a set of lines to keep their spark and processor fueled, and shut off everything else. It’s not the most comfortable thing for them, everything gets cold, then numb, then they can’t feel anything but their helm and chassis, but they’ll be fine. All someone has to do is fix them and add in an IV line. 

Nati’s job is to be an anatomy example. Everything from a 3d model, to a demonstration of the workings of organs, to an introduction to repairing and otherwise practicing medicine on living bots. As horrifying as it is in concept to have someone who you keep around specifically to injure and then fix, they were kept completely safe, and their commissioner/technically-owner made sure they were comfortable with everything. Went over procedures with them first while they were still new, talked them through things, made sure they knew they were allowed to protest if something upset them. Nothing ever really did.

They were occasionally dimly aware that this job would upset a lot of other people, mostly while they were doing things like watching one professor or another lift an organ clear of their frame to show people what it looked like, still hooked up to them. But they never really found themselves being upset by anything. They liked teaching. At worst, it was dull, something they’d done enough times that they’d just zone out and watch students instead of paying attention to much of anything. They paid attention often enough to soak up a great deal of medical knowledge, though. 

They mostly lived on the college campus. Since all the students were busy and the professors were older than them and also busy, most of their friends were the janitors. Those friendships tended to start as Nati was apologizing for having bled everywhere, tripping over things trying to help clean up, and explaining in the same breath that it was fine! It didn’t hurt! It was just a student who fumbled tying a knot. Still creepy, with them being transparent and covered in energon, but sort of endearing. They had a large bedroom of their own, and they did originally have a berth, but they asked to have it replaced. Specifically, with a heavily padded version of the shipping crates that their inanimate-model counterparts came shipped in. They saw a crate and wanted one, so they slept in a tank-bot-sized crate, with the lid shut and everything. They put off enough light to illuminate the space and not be in the dark. 

Most of the students liked them. Unnerving as it was to have them casually attempting to make conversation while they were bleeding out and ought to be in severe pain, they were nice. Tried to help, too, even though they were supposed to be not talking aside from stating what hurt most. Oh, and the trauma training- they were supposed to act panicked. Couldn’t manage any successful cries of pain, but they did wriggle a lot. And they tended to hug people who were freaking out too much. To the point where how well someone did on a trauma exam could be fairly easily assessed by the amount and spatter of energon on them. Small amount? To be expected. Large amount? Not great. Massive spurts, probably your patient ‘died’. Large amount, and in a hug-shaped splotch pattern? Your patient ‘died’ AND you panicked enough that Nati hugged you. 

When the war started to get bad, and the college was collateral damage, one of the emergency medics who turned up found Nati trying to help. They hadn’t been trained as a medic, and their servos weren’t medic-grade, but they knew how to stop bleeding in emergency situations- and they couldn’t just not try! They wound up being more or less adopted by the emergency medic, a bot who could produce minor force fields, and the combination of force field friend and all their redundancies kept them alive for the rest of things. That and luck, and the occasional bout of being mistaken for a ghost, zombie, and/or vampire. Dying mechs hyped up on adrenaline and terror will mistake a transparent bot for a lot of things! (and so will college students who haven’t slept lately and don’t realize that the medical area next door has a live anatomy example. They wound up as something of a campus cryptid.)

They also made an excellent storage for transplant organs. Take them out scavenging for fresh organs, and simply affix a connection point to the organs that’s compatible with the connections in Nati’s frame. Unplug a couple of their redundancies, plug those into the organ, wrap the organ in something and tuck it up to them with some bandages, and their systems will keep it energized, fresh, and clean until it’s ready to be transplanted. Which they’re happy to do! It saves lives! It does look kinda horrifying, though, someone reaching under Nati’s bandages to remove an organ that’s visibly plugged into them. 

Basically, Nati is a walking example of what could be considered body horror, and surprisingly sweet despite it. 

Below this, NSFW details!

Nati’s first physical sexual experience, beyond a bit of idle poking, was in someone’s reproductive anatomy class. Another professor asked to borrow them as an example, and they were 100% up for that as soon as someone explained what it would involve. 

And they do make an excellent example, because their equipment is transparent, too. You can see all the circuitry connecting the node clusters in their spike and in their valve lips, and the mechanisms of how it all pressurizes. And if you arch their back right, you can see their internal calipers. Works best with something for those calipers to clamp against, though. 

Which is why this particular class goes from “why is there a slightly nervous-looking and very transparent bot sitting on a table on the front of the class” to “ohh dear fuck” pretty fast. Because the answer to that question is “so we can put them in stirrups, rig a machine to thrust a dildo in and out of them without obstructing the view, aim a couple cameras at various parts of them including the brightly-lit pleasure center of their processor, and have the best anatomy example ever”. You can even see the energy flashing along the circuitry lines in their equipment if you look up close. 

And that coincidentally gives them a pretty strong exhibitionism kink. 

Their first non-masturbatory sexual encounter is probably a student who was in that class, equal parts fascinated and turned on, propositioning them at some point after. 

They’re a sweet little thing in berth. A little awkward, they don’t get too many partners (they look too weird and being in the dark makes it worse), but sweet. And terribly sexy if you like this sort of thing. If someone puts Nati on their front, they can watch the shifting of muscle cables as they squirm, and see the flickering of lights in their processor casing as their pleasure center lights up. Put them on their back, and one can watch one’s own spike spreading their calipers apart. It’s absolutely delicious.