Chapter Two

"So, you know him?" Prime, and most the other Autobots were staring at Prowl with open-mouthed amazement.

Evidently, Jazz was something of a legend and even a hero among the other Cybertronians, Decepticon and Autobot alike.

Prowl sat tight lipped and stiff.

"Yes. I know him." He said tersely. " We have a troubled history."

Prime glanced down at his servos in which Prowl had thrust several forms documenting the cheerful Jazz, who was under watch by Mirage at the time and probably laughing about it.

"Well," Prime shuffled through the papers.

Prowl noticed most of the Autobots had been staring as a point just above Prime's head, and now many of them were holding back smiles.

He was just turning to look up himself when Mirage burst in, all shades of guilt.

"Jazz!" he panted, "He's-"

"Right here."

Mirage, Prowl, and Prime jerked their helms upward to see Jazz hanging from his knees above Prime's head, a smirk on his face.

"Took ya long enough Mirage." Jazz chuckled, and neatly flipped down, landed gracefully-and silently-at Prowl's side.

Prime had a thunderstruck expression on his faceplates.

"You, you!" he burst out. "My old friend! You're Jazz!"

The grinning bot turned and peered up at him. "Do I know you?" he questioned teasingly. "You can't be the same Orion Pax turned Optimus Prime that I remember. The one I know didn't know how to run an army."

Optimus scooped Jazz up in his arms and hugged him tightly. "I thought you were killed in that battle. What happened?"

"Ah, just got captured but don't worry, I escaped."

Prime laughed. "You always were getting out of one scrape or another I remember. You were awfully good at making trouble and then getting out of it."

"And I was really good at keeping your processor intact." Jazz purred back.

"Ah remember you now!" Ironhide exclaimed.

Jazz looked down at him and waved. "Old boy, you seem to have shrunk. I think I could best you in wrestling now."

Prime laughed and gaily dumped the much smaller bot down on the ground in front of the old red and silver warrior.

Ironhide placed a heavy ped on his chest and held it there lightly.

"Wow, I guess I had the wrong perspective." Jazz grinned again and rolled out from under Ironhide's ped.

Ratchet tapped his own ped on the floor loudly and Jazz made a show of looking for him. "Old Ratch can't be around here, now can he? If Megatron's blown him up, I'll have to personally thank him, then kill him."

"You little rascal." Ratchet reached out as Jazz backed into range, and squeezed him affectionately. "You'll be getting a check up soon, I promise."

"Hey!" Jazz wriggled in Ratchet's grip. "If I'd known you were here, I'd never have signed up! You'll kill me someday with your sadistic healing methods!"

Ratchet released the wiggly assassin, and he did a handspring and a cartwheel back to Prowl's side.

"Troubled history?" the Porsche laughed softly. "I thought it was fun. Don't you remember this?" and just like that, Jazz had ghosted a servo down Prowl's back to stroke his aft while he took the SIC's chin and touched their foreheads together.

The silence from around the room spoke volumes of the shock the others were experiencing.

"That, that was you?" Prowl spluttered, moving back from Jazz, the other letting him go and gazing at him. "Were you really a slave?"

"Yep." Jazz grinned at him. "Thanks for rescuing me, really. If not for you, this universe would never have been graced by my admirable performances." He bowed to the others, who clapped.

Prowl had a hard time believing that.

Jazz grin faded as he saw the look on Prowl's face. " Come on man, honestly. You should feel proud to have been the hero that day."

Prowl inwardly flinched.

"Don't think I didn't hear." Jazz whispered softly.

"Fine." Prowl suddenly snapped. "You're staying with me. No going anywhere without me along to supervise. Understand?"

Jazz knelt on one knee. "Yes master." He said softly. "I understand."

"Jazz, please. I need to check you all over. It's protocol." Ratchet was losing patience quickly with the Porsche, who refused to let anyone touch his visor.

Prowl had long since lost his patience, and ordered Jazz to let Ratchet finish his medical exam, but Jazz seemed to be deaf to his commands, crouched up in a back corner of the ceiling.

"No!" Jazz snapped again.

Ratchet sighed and stomped over under Jazz.

"Don't make me drag you down from there." He warned.

Jazz flashed him a wicked and entirely humorless grin. "You can't."

Prowl didn't understand, but Ratchet, who knew Jazz better, backed off several steps and kept trying to coax the stubborn bot down.

Prowl quietly called for backup.

Within seconds, Ironhide and Prime had stepped in, locking the door behind them.

Jazz shot a betrayed look at Prowl, and shrank even further back in his corner.

"Don't." he warned.

"Ratchet, we've never looked at his optical sight before. I'm sure it's not really necessary." Prime suggested.

"Now there's a mech with sense." Jazz looked relived.

"You're not taking his side!" Ironhide, Prowl, and Ratchet shouted at the same time, and Prime flinched, and held his hands up.

"All I'm saying is… where's Jazz?"

They all looked where Jazz had been.

He was gone.

Screaming.

That was all Prowl could hear through the medic bay's doors as he paced outside them.

They had finally caught the runaway saboteur a few days later, and dragged him, in ankle and wrist cuffs, back to the med bay.

Jazz had cussed them all out, and had spat out that if he had to suffer this, only Ratchet could be there.

So Prowl, Ironhide, and Prime were waiting just outside, in case the old medic needed help.

They heard Ratchet swearing dreadfully, and metallic cracking and grinding.

Then they heard the cuffs snapping, and Ratchet began yelling for help.

All three burst through the doors, slamming and locking them behind themselves, and threw themselves on Jazz, partly freed from the berth, writhing madly and screaming.

Blue rivulets of energon poured from the edges of his partially removed visor, and Ratchet was lying quite stunned on the floor nearby, a nasty dent on the side of his helm, and energon splattered across his front.

Prowl felt a surge of possessiveness and protectiveness, and while Prime and Ironhide rushed to Ratchet's side, he went to Jazz.

As he laid his hands on Jazz's face, the bot's face twisted in pain, fear, and hate, and he clawed desperately at Prowl, making the other bot thankful Jazz didn't actually have claws, whereas he did.

What he wasn't expecting was the strong magnetic surge that threw him backwards across the room, knocking his circuits out for a few kliks.

"Watch his fingers!" he called out to Ironhide, who was lunging for Jazz, who slid out of the rest of his bindings and rolled out of the heavy warrior's path.

Jazz turned his head and cocked it to the side, then began moving quickly, his audial horns twitching as he navigated the now-messy med bay.

Prowl could barely hear the faint, high clicking the Porsche was emitting; he was using echolocation to find his way around.

"Jazz is blind?" he questioned dumbly, and Ratchet, who had been helped to his feet by Prime, glared at him.

Prowl blinked stupidly.

His processor felt jammed and sluggish and Ratchet rolled his optics before marching over noisily and messing with his circuits for about a breem, before Prowl felt back to normal.

By that time, Prime and Ironhide had cornered Jazz once again, this time against a flat wall, and were gently coaxing him into letting them take him back to the berth to complete his checkup.

Which was fast turning into a medical emergency when Jazz leaped straight up in the air and ninja-kicked Ironhide in the throat, knocking him back before Prime had snatched him in both huge servos and held him firmly in mid-air, kicking and starting to scream again as the Autobot leader carried him back to a clean berth.

"NOOOOO!" Jazz wailed as Prime and Prowl pinned him to the berth.

Jazz was strong for his size, immensely so, but he was no match for Prime, and with Prowl's help, and Ironhide's once he was on his feet again, and he was firmly held in place as Ratchet dismantled the rest of the visor assembly and removed it, resulting in a rush of energon.

Ratchet, swearing softly, stopped the flow of fluid, and then stared in horror that was Jazz's exposed face.

Horribly infected gouges had transformed his face around the area just under the visor into a mangled mess, and sightless red orbs were cruelly bolted in place in the grossly disfigured sockets where his optics were supposed to be.

"Megatron's doing, I'm sure." Prime said as he examined the claw marks.

"How can he even see?" Prowl asked, horrified.

Ratchet was examining the visor. " Someone installed this visor to re-direct his optical sensors into it. Without the visor, he is completely blind."

"There's gotta be somethin' we can do about his face!" Ironhide exclaimed, having never taken his eyes from the blemished mass of infection around the blood-red orbs.

"And there is." Ratchet said.

Jazz, who had gone completely silent once the visor was gone, growled. "Don't touch me."

Ratchet nodded to Prime, Ironhide, and Prowl, and all three pinned the smaller bot's body beneath their's, leaving just his face exposed.

"Oh." Was all Jazz said.

Who knew how many hours later, a sedated Jazz was helped to his feet, the ninja bot collapsing weakly against Prowl for support.

Ratchet had cut away all the infected area, and cleaned up any wound, old or new, on his face.

He had then removed the red crystals from his optical sockets, and cleaned all the delicate sensors inside and around them.

New optics were on order, but for now, the blue visor was firmly back in place.

Every one was relived, because the scarring was horrific, though Ratchet said he could cut that way later when he installed the new optics.

He also unlocked the retracting system on the visor, so he would not have to remove it completely the next time he operated on Jazz.

Prowl helped Jazz to his own berth room, deciding that just for tonight the exhausted little bot could sleep with him.

As he slid into berth next to him, Jazz snuggled up to Prowl, curling his body into the contours of Prowl's body, and clung to him.

That was how they stayed all night long.