round the decay of that colossal wreck

He/him. Writer, elder statesman, retired despot. He is very big and he has PTSD.

They/them. Cat. Casette. Casatte. They are very small and they have PTSD.

She/her. Seeker, partially retired despot. She is smaller than she used to be and she has PTSD.

He/him. Loadbearer. Alias: Ultra Magnus. He is very small, with the potential to be very large, and he has PTSD.

(Mostly) He/him. Casette player. He is big and he has PTSD.

She/her. First Delegate, trying not to be a despot. She is Seeker-sized and she has PTSD.

Granddaughter and grandfather. Air Commander and General. Poet and Poet. Hydrogen baby and coughing bomb. In a way, the heart; the spark; the One True Thing at the core of colossal wreck.

"How would you describe your relationship with the accused?"
"I’m Megatron's right-hand arm officer. I’m Megatron's granddaughter. I’m his confidant, his best seeker, his silly falcon."

She wants him to be proud of her. He is so, so proud of her.

She was raised on his writing and it shows.

James Baldwin: "The bottom line is this: You write in order to change the world, knowing perfectly well that you probably can’t, but also knowing that literature is indispensable to the world. The world changes according to the way people see it, and if you alter, even by a millimeter, the way people look at reality, then you can change it…If there is no moral question, there is no reason to write. I’m an old-fashioned writer and, despite the odds, I want to change the world"

Kid, keep your knuckles up, front of the fists...

Kestrel's grandravage! Ravage's grandkestrel!

Ravage thinks that Kestrel is their kitten and/or casette; "Tiny little plane. Baby. Must feed and teach and protect." Kestrel disagrees with this assessment vehemently, but is not exactly complaining about Ravage deciding that they need to train and play with her.

Teacher and student. Predecessor and replacement as cityspeaker. Mother and daughter.

Amica Endurae. Soundwave is more faithful to Megatron than Megatron is to himself.

"Alright," thinks Megatron, "I'll play along. You think you'll be different from me."

Thematic foils!

T: Like one of the important thematic parallels is the Windblade-Megatron "going to change the world for the better as the figurehead of a populist movement against the status quo that dominated the last few millions of years" parallel. Being convinced that you're fully in the right and that the decisions you make out of a deep personal conviction of what justice looks like are actually just is dangerous.
For example, one of the very important decisions Windblade makes in wreckverse is having Starscream freed from prison basically in secret.
She's got a manifold reason to make this decision: she cares about Starscream on a personal level, she doesn't believe that confining someone to prison forever is just, and she's working on larger-scale prison reforms and reviewing the cases of a lot of mechs sitting in prison; but she also bypasses the courts and the legal system to do what she thinks is right.
This actually kickstarts part of the plot of the Cybertron part of wreckverse because Megatron has been keeping tabs on Starscream as best he can, and when he stops getting news about how Starscream is doing in prison he kind of assumes that this means nothing good for him and goes on a hunger strike to demand answers.
(It isn't until many years later that Windblade is actually told about the connection there—she assumed it was a coincidence.)

'currently conjunxed to an ex-member of decepticon high command' support group.

“I’m not going to retroactively interfere with an independent judicial decision,” said Windblade. Minimus lifted an eyebrow of polite skepticism.

"What are your intentions with my grandfather?"

And as I hung up the phone, it occurred to me / she'd grown up just like me / my girl was just like me...

Mentor and mentee. Mother and daughter.

Conjunx Endurae.

"I'm so much bigger with you."

T: important parts of wreckverse: megatron and starscream have at this point had every argument they will ever have in their lives, and are now running out of things to get mad at each other for, so now they have no other option but to get along

Also T: starscream WILL kill if there are rumors about her being nice or sentimental or god forbid liking megatron

It is notable that she raises her mentee on his writing.

"like obv it depends on the type of relationship and abuse tying [characters] but i am weak for reconciliations that are actually just surrendering. you fight your whole life for nothing and it's fine. it's fine. it's easier to give in."

Amica Endurae, eventually.

Wind-voice.

Conjunx Endurae. Starscream can't tell if she's Windblade's trophy wife or Windblade's pet assassin. But either of those would be preferable to all the other alternatives.

Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair!

I came to the cities in a time of disorder
When hunger reigned there.
I came among men in a time of revolt
And I rebelled with them.
So passed my time
Which had been given to me on earth.

My food I ate between battles
To sleep I lay down among murderers
Love I practised carelessly
And nature I looked at without patience.
So passed my time
Which had been given to me on earth.

All roads led into the mire in my time.
My tongue betrayed me to the butchers.
There was little I could do.
But those in power
Sat safer without me: that was my hope.
So passed my time
Which had been given to me on earth.

Our forces were slight.
Our goal
Lay far in the distance
It was clearly visible, though I myself
Was unlikely to reach it.
So passed my time
Which had been given to me on earth.

You who will emerge from the flood
In which we have gone under
Remember
When you speak of our failings
The dark time too
Which you have escaped.

For we went, changing countries oftener than our shoes
Through the wars of the classes, despairing
When there was injustice only, and no rebellion.

And yet we know:
Hatred, even of meanness
Contorts the features.
Anger, even against injustice
Makes the voice hoarse. Oh, we
Who wanted to prepare the ground for friendliness
Could not ourselves be friendly.

But you, when the time comes at last
And man is a helper to man
Think of us
With forbearance.

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Not marble, nor the gilded monuments
Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme;
But you shall shine more bright in these contents
Than unswept stone, besmear’d with sluttish time.
When wasteful war shall statues overturn,
And broils root out the work of masonry,
Nor Mars his sword nor war’s quick fire shall burn
The living record of your memory.
‘Gainst death and all-oblivious enmity
Shall you pace forth; your praise shall still find room
Even in the eyes of all posterity
That wear this world out to the ending doom.
So, till the judgment that yourself arise,
You live in this, and dwell in lovers’ eyes.