>I feel compelled to ask, though: is Shingoji unaware of Olaf
>Petersson

She is, yes. His existence is not well-known in the 25th century.

>In fact, I also went and re-read Transformers: Flesh
>and Steel, and noticed a peculiar detail: like a Friend, Optimus
>Prime's "beast" mode has clothes that are a part of him.

As far as I know, that's just a coincidence. There are at least two other "human-type" Transformers with no connection to Meta Eridani III (PCHammer and Alita Ironheart; in Hammer's case, his, er, chassis isn't even based on Maximal protoform technology like Gally's is), and their transformation protocols also involve clothing or a reasonable approximation thereof. (Exactly how that works is a thing best not examined too closely.)

>Gives me the (deeply unlikely) idea that the transmode virus (or some
>mutated descendant thereof) might be a necessary factor in the
>creation of Friends.

This could still be true, to the extent that the introduction of an alien technovirus into the environment may have altered the planet. It already had anomalous Energon before the Beast Wars, for instance, but there was no record from that era of anything like Sandstar Rho. Now, admittedly, the Predacons (except Tarantulas, who didn't exactly publish his findings) didn't care much about investigating the oddities of the world they found themselves on, and though the Axalon was a survey ship, the Maximals were a bit busy at the time, so they may all simply have missed it. If it wasn't there before then, however, that may suggest a connection. I honestly don't know—it wasn't something I consciously intended to imply in Friends Like These, anyway.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.