Human

A typical human.

Humans (also known as: fleshlings, organics, meatbags, insects, squishies, noisy creatures, "puny flesh creatures", "dumb stubbies", "sentient bags of goo", "little screamers", "bit players", Terrans or Homo sapiens as they prefer) are bipedal and usually tiny organic beings found on Earth and other similar planets. Though quite fragile, and technologically backwards, they have at times aided the Autobots and thwarted the Decepticons once the Transformers' age-old war spilled onto the humans' primitive homeworld. And sometimes, they're the spawn of Unicron.

Overview

Physiology

Humans come in both Tall and Venti.

Humans are suspiciously familiar creatures. Though they are made of soft, organic materials, they share remarkable physical similarities with Transformers as a species. Most humans, like most Transformers, are bilaterally symmetrical bipeds, with their primary sensory and communication interfaces located prominently on their heads. Like Transformers, they are social creatures, who trade and barter wares and develop emotional attachments to peers. Eerily enough, they possess an emotional spectrum nearly identical to that of Transformers as well, ranging from laughter, joy, and satisfaction to depression, anger, and cruelty. It is not uncommon to find Transformers who have even developed strong spiritual bonds with individual creatures. This is disgusting.

Humans are physically composed of several specialized units or systems called organs. The major organs are internalized, but extremely frail. Damage is hard to repair, and they have yet to develop an efficient method of replicating these organs, instead relying on external devices that can substitute for their functions. Energy metabolism by these creatures is distressingly inefficient, and as a result, humans are nearly always producing waste substances in a variety of phases of matter. Suggestions of strategies to reuse said waste material for further energy extraction are met with a spectrum of responses, ranging from sheepish giggling to nauseating disgust. It is advised to avoid the discussion, and the waste material, as much as possible.

Optimus Prime learns of human reproduction.

A human's organic tissue will begin failing just one quarter into their lifespan, and will spend the next three quarters growing ever less efficient until the human's lifeforce can no longer sustain itself. As a result, humans are saddeningly short-lived creatures. It is not known how they find the time to accomplish anything, though as a side effect it has made their wars mercifully short. Interestingly, humans do not build new members of their race. To the contrary, humans partake in what they call sexual reproduction: those with one subvariant of their reproductive anatomy implant structural data, which they call "DNA" (suspiciously similar to CNA), into those with the other. This process grows a new human (or occasionally more than one, although this is rare) inside the host like a parasite until it emerges roughly three quarters of an Earth year later. (If it exits the host too early, the new human risks death.) The new human is very fragile and stupid; it will take years to acclimate itself to their society. Even a young human who stayed inside its host for the appropriate length of time is not capable of operating self-sufficiently without extensive training. Despite this limited intelligence and understanding (or perhaps as a result of it), younger humans are often among the first to form bonds with friendly Transformers.

Occasionally, Cybertronian science has been able to exploit the adaptable nature of human physiology in the binary bonding process. Even though this may confer tactical advantages in battle, the chief disadvantage is the continual vulnerability incurred by maintenance of a squishy and typically uncooperative human co-partner. Careful: they're slimy.

Some humans claim to inhabit dubiously-named places such as "Claw City."

Initiating the growth of a new human apparently involves much rubbing, and also kissing. Though the required interactions have been hinted at in popular media, humans are reticent to discussing the physical mechanism, and several attempts at accumulating further data were met with what they term as "awkward silence". This is quite confusing, as humans generally give the impression that they supremely enjoy it, and have refused all suggestions that they learn the technology to build their own from spare parts. Nothing if not adaptable, humans are even capable of producing hybrid offspring with populations of sufficiently humanoid aliens, such as Vulcans.

Similar to Transformer outliers, a highly noticeable subpopulation of humans are born or gifted with fantastical abilities far beyond what one would expect a human body to possess, such as telepathy, unaided flight, or accelerated healing. These super-powered beings, sometimes referred to as "mutants", often assemble themselves in groups and fight crime.

Technology

The humans of Earth wear hard hats regardless of their profession.

Although Earth is rich with natural resources, Human technology is surprisingly primitive. They had only begun to experiment with outer atmosphere travel at the time the Great War (or another such first contact event) began on Earth, and they have limited communication methods. Although their locomotive devices, called "cars", are suitable for alternate modes, they are quite crude, potentially dangerous, and incredibly energy inefficient.

Human military technology is equally unimpressive. They have yet to develop any form of workable energy weapons, and no shield technology either. Their primary weapons are guns, but they are not integrated into their bodies and instead of lasers they shoot small, metallic projectiles called "bullets" using a crude explosive called "gunpowder". These are more than capable of killing other humans, but they are extremely inefficient when fending off any attacking Decepticons.

One possible future outcome for human civilization.

In some universes humans have developed weaponry that is actually rather effective against a Transformer. Chumley was able to develop advanced technology to capture and torture Transformers, and Baroness was confident in her ability to incapacitate them. Some human warriors used kinetic projectiles called "Sabot rounds" that employ an incredibly high heat to burn through Decepticon armour and then detonate in the more vulnerable innards.

In a rare achievement for this life form, humans have created perhaps the most advanced storage medium in the known universe—the floppy disk. Though ostensibly archaic, these devices can surprisingly hold immense amounts of data, ranging from advanced super-weapon formulae to the multi-million-year-old mind of a Cybertronian with perfect fidelity.

In other universes, humans have developed technology almost on par with the Transformers after reverse-engineering Cybertronian biology and technology. These developments can range anywhere from simple suits of powered armour to full-fledged, Earth-born Transformers. Humans have also been known to upgrade themselves with technology, thus becoming cyborgs. In one notable universe, humans reached the Terran Singularity - aping, perfecting, and then eventually outstripping the technological achievements of Cybertronians- and reorganized themselves into the interplanetary Human Confederacy. The humans of this particular universe however eventually descended into brutal civil wars, heralding a dark age for their species.

Military

In general, human militaries are not a match for Transformer technologies, especially not upon first contact.

As mentioned earlier, most human weapons are ineffective against Transformers. However, human technology is always advancing, and there have been occasions that human weapons are potent enough to be desirable even by Decepticon standards!

In addition, humans throughout the multiverse have often organised their most elite troops into special units. While some of these units are worse than ineffective, others are capable enough to actively stand against Transformers with some measure of success.

Society

Humans require tokens representative of energy, and are not above humiliating themselves to retrieve them.

Like on Cybertron before the war, humans make up the fabric of their local (or global) economies. Some work as repairmen, some are drillers in search of un-processed lubricants, others are retrievers of rare mineral lattices and metals, and a few accomplish all of these simultaneously. The humans strangely use the majority of the lubricant they extract as a highly inefficient source of energy, and adorn themselves with the harvested minerals and metals at exorbitant prices. Instead of trading valuable energy directly for goods and services, human commerce more typically focuses on segments of metals, or colored paper.

A number of unsavory humans subvert this established system to illegally or immorally obtain currency. Many of these humans were involved in unusual accidents which empowered the individual specimen to levels above ordinary humans, while others are tempted by their relatively high intelligence levels or capacity for selfish acts. Encounters with these subversive humans happen at an alarming rate, whether they be failed entertainers who claim to own all Transformers, mad scientists, or gifted archers who dress in homage to Earth folklore. By sheer numbers, these humans must represent half of the known population. Sometimes, these sorts will organize into groups of like-minded rogues; much like their military, these gangs can range from generally ineffectual to surprisingly dangerous.

Politically, humans are divided among various nation-states which seem to be divided primarily among ethnic, linguistic, and religious differences; from observational data, most humans appear to inhabit two of these nation-states in particular, either the United States of America or Japan. On occasion, human nation-states will engage in conflict over territory and resources, but as previously stated, their wars are usually quite short (one war, however, proved so long and brutal that the Transformers felt Earth was too dangerous to remain). Most humans seem to prefer some sort of democracy where they elect individuals to govern and legislate their nation-states, although a number of them choose their leaders due to genetic inheritance and familial succession; others still hold power through a Decepticon-style dictatorship, though the mental stability of a few have been questioned. At times, the Decepticons have taken advantage of Earth's factional tendencies to manipulate them to their advantage, but the Autobots have usually managed to expose the Decepticon influence before a full-scale military conflict occurs.

In those rare universes where humans achieve interplanetary travel, the divisions of their nation states seem to have been largely, if not totally, dissolved. In such worlds, humans tend to adopt a peaceful and diplomatic approach with regards to their interactions with alien species, setting embassies on other worlds or signing interstellar peace treaties.

Humans have created many languages, which they employ incessantly. These serve a similar communicative purpose to languages used by Cybertronians. Amazingly, while it seems to be easy for Cybertronians to effortlessly acquire fluency in human languages with minimal human contact, Cybertronian linguistic units often remain unpronounceable by humans.

Humans come in a variety of shapes, sizes and colors.

Humans greatly enjoy sound patterns, termed "music". The Autobots Jazz and Blaster have taken a particular interest in this music, though the chosen volume has overwhelmed most other Autobots, including the mighty Optimus Prime from time to time. Humans have often shown an involuntary need to move about when music is broadcast, and even the aforementioned Autobots have also shown a desire to move about. Presumably, a fear of blowback prevented the Autobots from utilizing human music as a weapon against the Decepticons.

Humans are also athletic creatures, engaging in a variety of athletic events that are designed to test their strength, stamina, and speed. While none of them could hold their own against even the weakest Transformer, many human sports have been eagerly adopted by Transformers. The Autobot Eject is particularly fond of human athletics, and his vocabulary is littered with the human sports quotes.

Humans also enjoy watching moving images, termed "Films". Transformers also enjoy making and watching these films. Transformers have even appeared in some films made by human beings.

Similar to Transformers, humans are a gendered species, with at least two known genders. The most commonly-encountered are male humans; the other common gender, female humans, much like female Transformers, tend to appear less frequently in the Transformers' adventures, though they seem to have a much closer gender ratio than the 1:12 Transformers are sometimes shown to have.^[1]

Religion

Common human depictions of gods incorporate long flowing facial hair, staffs and other kingly apparel.

Despite their lack of the multi-dimensional transwarp Spark, a great number of humans believe in an analogous concept, the intangible soul. This has been confirmed to be the equivalent of a Transformer's personality program in an odd experiment, when the human Spike Witwicky's personality was uploaded to an empty Transformer body cobbled together from spare parts. The human's consciousness was not suitable for digitization, and quickly deteriorated toward psychosis.

Though Transformers directly observed humans originate from earlier life forms, this seemingly does not prevent most humans from also believing in an origin involving supernatural beings, either singular or plural, whom they presume to continue to have a direct but intangible stake in their lives. Once a week the more religious humans will gather together and sing songs at the ceiling, as the presumed direction of these beings is away from the gravity well of their planet. Unlike the historical Covenant of Primus, their holy books are not incorruptible encrypted public-key datatrax. Instead, they frequently re-encode the writings of multiple authors in an inefficient and apparently lossy process. Then they fight about which "translation" of their texts is correct instead of simply downloading the original encoding algorithm.

The few sources available claim that their progenitor/planet (whom they either descended from or simply formed upon its body) is quite at odds with their traditions, and is apparently totally displeased with their existence. However, the same sources have shown that ancient humans may have revered artifacts once belonging to the Thirteen, immensely powerful quasi-divine beings from Cybertron's ancient past, but ultimately as mortal as any other Transformer. Their understanding of the artifacts was incredibly limited, making their reverence of them quite puzzling. One other human deity was also shown to have been nothing more than a traveller from another world.

Breeding grounds

The most familiar breed of humans are native to the planet Earth, though they can be found practically anywhere in the galaxy. For example, Nebulos is such a place, though some reports claim these humans are of a green palette rather than various shades of beige & brown. Femax is populated by humans of Transformer size. Pz-Zazz is also home to Transformer-sized humans, but it is not known whether they are indigenous to that world. It is possible that the tiny version of humans found on Earth is the exception, rather than the rule. In timelines where humans have the capability of interstellar flight, they have been known to establish colonies of their own, continuing to breed on those worlds.

Notes

• For reasons unknown, a substantial number of human Transformers fans appear to have a very drastic, dismissive position when it comes to the inclusion of representatives of their species in Transformers fiction, some even going as far as demanding that Transformers fiction should be devoid of any flesh creatures whatsoever, unless being depicted as helpless victims/casualties of Decepticon attacks.
• Perhaps most bizarrely, humans can hear the trans-sonic signal known as the Omega Frequency, emitted by the Omega Lock and other sources of Primus's power, while Transformers cannot.
• Humans reproduce by shooting DNA into each other. I find that offensive!
• According to Scorponok, a certain percentage of human physiology is composed of cowardice. This proportion increases directly according to the size of the individual. Pretender to the Throne!
• In some universes, Transformers have come into contact with humans with strange and unusual powers. These so-called "superhumans" have been known to organise themselves into teams, sometimes specifically to battle Transformers or to protect (or even avenge) their less gifted fellows. One such individual once managed to topple the mighty Megatron himself during a fight. While it was at best a temporary victory, it was still impressive. Even more impressive, another superhuman once made Unicron himself recoil in pain, a feat even the combined might of the Autobot and Decepticon armies were unable to pull off. And concerning the wider Megaverse, groups of humans have been known to be related to the Transformers, including a highly-trained special mission force employed by the US government to stop terrorist organizations, a team of specialists equipped with advanced helmets and multi-function vehicles, and a group of humans and one alien imbued with the power of shape-shifting fighting against a race of mind-controlling alien slugs attempting to conquer Earth.
• Of all the species that Vector Prime has ever encountered, humans have asked the most questions. Ask Vector Prime

External links

• Humans like to write about themselves. This, too, erupts into war.
• Humans on the IDW Hasbro Wiki

References

1. ↑ Transformers: The Covenant of Primus