Title: Spare Tires
Warning: This inhabits a weird area where it's a humor fic, but people sensitive to misunderstandings causing serious discomfort probably shouldn't read.
Rating: PG-13
Continuity: G1
Characters: Autobots. And some Decepticons. Everybody?
Disclaimer: The theatre doesn't own the script or actors, nor does it make a profit from the play.
Motivation (Prompt): Scenes set in the Third Wheel fic universe without actually being in the story. Fits in between Pt. 14 and 15 of Third Wheel, and just after the last chapter here.
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Part Six
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Smokescreen had involved exactly four mechs from the start: Ironhide, Red Alert, Trailbreaker, and himself. He'd made the case that Prowl had a right to feel comfortable in his offtime, and anyway, it'd be a treat for the whole outpost to surprise them with Prowl's presence. The chance to play tactical games against the Tachead would be fun! A challenge! An opportunity Smokescreen didn't want Jazz screwing up just by being himself!
Which had been a convincing argument in and of itself, given Jazz's normal behavior around Prowl. Ironhide usually let things among equal ranks sort themselves out, but he wasn't totally oblivious to the situation. He probably figured it'd do both officers good; Prowl could socialize with the outpost off-duty and Jazz could practice his escape arts.
His approval of the plan got Trailbreaker the extra energon. Once Smokescreen welded the door shut, a memo went out to the outpost as a whole, tagging everyone off-duty with a notice for the game in the side hall in twenty minutes, sign-ups starting immediately, and Trailbreaker set up to babysit the closet amidst a stampede of people on their way to fight over who got to play. Not surprising in the least, reading the memo was enough to gain everyone's cooperation with the plan. No help was to be found for poor, locked-up Jazz.
But, oh, was there a price to be paid for that outpost-wide desertion later.
Such whining Outpost 49-B6-4 had never heard.
"He what?! You - he what? You did - I. Why - but I - why didn't you - I - you - how could you - I - you - I hate you! I hate you so much! Fragging Pit I hate every last one-a ya!" Jazz spun around and started pointing. "I hate you, and you," Mirage leaned back, affronted, "yeah you! And you and you and you and I hate your table, and I especially hate you!" Smokescreen continued to sip his ration, unaffected. Jazz sputtered and waved his hands, so angry he could only stamp his feet. "Shove that cube up your trunk, ya junk-muncher! Twist it sideways while you're at it! Primus alive an' kickin', I hate you so much I - I - " Clenching his fists, he drew himself up, doors shaking so hard he vibrated.
And then he collapsed over the table, all but prostrate before the Praxian. His engine stalled out in a pathetic hiccup. "Tell me everything. Don't spare me th' details."
Interested optics watched the show from all over the messhall. "I didn't know his voice could go that high," Hound whispered to Trailbreaker.
"He shrieked at me when I blocked the air duct. Reeeeeeally painful to hear. He put his speakers behind it." Trailbreaker pretended to wince in remembered pain, and not just at the volume. He'd learned four new words guaranteed to offend someone.
Hound looked at him sidelong. "He got into the air duct?"
"Yeah, I'm still trying to figure out how, too."
They pondered the intrinsic impossibility of fitting someone Jazz's size into the closet's air vent for a while.
"Jazz," Hound decided at last. Trailbreaker looked askance at him, and he shrugged, spreading his hands. "That's all I've got. It's Jazz. That's the whole explanation, right there."
Fair enough. Trailbreaker nodded. "Jazz."
"Exactly."
They went back to watching Mirage, Smokescreen, and Wheeljack take turns winding the Head of Special Operations into a writhing knot of need. Jazz wailed like a tormented spark. Tales of Prowl smiling and congratulating his opponents had Jazz sobbing despair and desire into the table. Someone offered a grainy copy of the security camera footage. The black-and-white made little blubbering noises of sad want.
Many looks were exchanged as the people present to witness his pitiful display unanimously agreed that it had been a brilliant idea to lock him in that closet. Subjecting Prowl to Jazz on a good day tested Prowl's patience. They would have had to put him on a leash to keep him down during the game, and explaining that to Prowl would have just been awkward.
So the first time Smokescreen put Jazz in time-out, he succeeded through subterfuge. Well done, Smokescreen. The Special Operations Division gave him a nod of respect for that.
The second time he put Jazz in the closet, it was via official means. Jazz was on the lookout for trickery, after all. He wasn't on the lookout for a double-shift.
"Say what now?" Smokescreen heard him mutter from across the courtyard as the duty schedule updated, and then a wide blue visor whipped up to stare in betrayed disbelief at him. "Aw, y'didn't."
Smokescreen smirked.
"Y'did." Jazz glanced around like he was wondering if he could make a run for it, but lo and behold, shiny doom descended upon him. Bright red and golden yellow suddenly sandwiched him in an totally non-erotic way. Jazz looked smaller than usual between Sideswipe and Sunstreaker, and he grimaced as he looked up at them. "Aw, c'mon, that ain't fair."
His legs kicked air futilely as they physically picked him up by the upper arms. "Ironhide ordered us to escort you to your assigned station," Sunstreaker informed him.
"It's a closet!"
"A closet now stocked with the outpost's finest selection of filework." Sideswipe grinned broadly, smoothing the flat of his hand across the sky to clear Jazz's imagination for the wonders in store and storage for him. "Just picture all that filing you've been putting off doing! We shall escort you to your Closet of Concentration, kind sir, and soon all that work will be done."
"Suck exhaust an' die!"
Both frontliners froze, and any sympathy Jazz might have had in the courtyard disappeared. Even as a joke, wishing death on a fellow Autobot was bad luck. It was Not Done in a big way. Optics narrowed. The sentries pointedly turned their backs. Even Perceptor huffed.
Ooo, yeah, public opinion had dried up.
Jazz knew he'd gone too far as soon as he said it. Wincing, he dropped his voice to a contrite murmur. "Frag, that was outta line. Sorry, guys. No excuse."
Without a word, the twins turned in perfect coordination to carry him into the outpost. He hung from their grasp looking apologetic.
Not that he didn't try to escape the moment they were inside, of course. But they were expecting it, and he didn't pull out any weaponry while squirming loose. They let go of his arms, caught him by the ankles, and smoothly resumed walking with barely a pause. He dug his fingers into the floor as they dragged him along. "Lemme goooo, I promise I'll be good! I'll stand in the back an' keep my mouth shut an' everything!"
"Yeah, no. Not believing that. You kinda can't, Jazz."
"You have no self control around him. No offense."
"None taken," Jazz said cheerfully enough, considering the fact that his fingers were grooving furrows through the floor. "But why can't I try? Everyone else gets a shot!" That was the part that smarted worse than being kept away from the game itself. Everyone off-duty was given the chance to ogle Prowl having a good time. Why couldn't he join the crowd? All he wanted was to watch Prowl play!
Admittedly, the likelihood of him being able to stop at watching was slim to none. He really did have no self-control when it came to Prowl.
"You can't," Sideswipe grunted, turning with his brother to yank on Jazz's legs as the saboteur hooked the edge of a floor sheet, "because you'll scare him away. We like him. We want him to come back."
"I'm not that bad!"
Skreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek! Metal bent, gradually peeling up from the floor. Jazz scrabbled for another grip.
Sunstreaker handed Jazz's foot to Sideswipe, letting the red mech handle twice the desperate kicking while he walked back to crouch down by Jazz's hands. He began to pick fingers free one by one. "You're terrible," he told the black-and-white matter-of-factly as he worked.
"Am not." Jazz clamped down harder, scowling. "And y' can't tell me Hound's any better. I've seen him slobber over Smokescreen's doors."
"Smokescreen's playing censor. He lectures people when they get too bad." Sideswipe grunted, pinning Jazz's feet under his arms so the wiggly mech couldn't kick him anymore. "He booted me out to cool down, last time." Anyone whose fans hit a certain pitch was banned from the room until they, ahem, took care of the problem.
"He did?" Jazz blinked over his shoulder. Sunstreaker pried his last finger up, and fat, rounded metal curls shaved from the floor as Sideswipe heaved, dragging the smaller mech down the hall. "Nooooooooo I don't wanna gooooooo!" He knew better than to call for help this time, since it seemed to be a huge outpost conspiracy, but that didn't mean he couldn't fuss. "No no no no no! You can't make me!" Against all proof that they could, although the three of them knew that he hadn't escaped because he was technically reporting - under duress - for duty. It made Jazz feel better to struggle, okay?
Loudly. "Nooooo no no no why can't I at least get locked in my office? I got an office! It's got a chair! So I hear, anyway."
Sunstreaker barked a laugh at the thoughtful statement. "That's exactly why the office won't work. You'd break the lock in three seconds just on principle."
"I promise I'll be good?"
"Pfft."
"Pretty please with extra ammo on top let me go?" Jazz begged soft and pretty, twisting to look up at the golden mech walking as rear guard. "I know whose palm t' grease t' get a case of that polish you like."
Sunstreaker faltered.
Sideswipe tugged extra hard on Jazz's legs, pulling ahead pointedly. "No," the red twin said in a firm voice. "You're going in the closet. We're under orders."
"Nooooooo - "
Up ahead, a familiar shape turned the corner.
The strident protest cut off abruptly on a hissed curse.
Prowl looked up from his tablet to nod a greeting to Sideswipe as they passed each other, but he stopped dead as he registered what the frontliner was dragging.
"'sup?" Jazz slid by on his side, one hand on his hip and the other propping up his head, elbow scraping along the floor just ahead of Sunstreaker's feet.
"Hello?" Dumbfounded, Prowl stared down at the black-and-white sliding past. Nothing in his experience had prepared him for this.
Jazz was cooler than cool. He was ultra-cool. He did this every day. Twice a day when he felt like it. That's how cool he was right now. "How ya doin'?"
"I…am fine. Are you - ?" Prowl looked at Jazz, then at Sideswipe, then at Sunstreaker. Sideswipe grinned. Sunstreaker looked like an angry wall. A gorgeous, angry wall, which only he could manage. It was a special class of blank expression reserved for beautiful mechs with bad temperaments. Prowl quickly looked back to Jazz, optics widening slightly in silent question. Should he be helping the downed officer? Was - was this somehow sanctioned dragging?
And what had his life come to that he wondered if this was a regular occurrence around here.
Jazz raised his hand off his hip to give the Praxian a jaunty salute. "Have fun beatin' the scrap outta Wheeljack tonight. Heard he almost had y' last time."
Prowl turned slowly to watch him go, doors sagging and tablet hanging forgotten from his hand. He'd been in no way prepared for the outpost's version of normal everyday life. "I…thank you. Will, ah. Will you be there?" The numb astonishment filling his voice made the polite inquiry sound like dread.
If Jazz flinched at it, he covered in a casual, dismissive wave. "Pssht, nah, I'm on duty. Catch y' later!" Looking bored, he resumed his uber-casual pose as Sideswipe dragged him out of sight around the corner. The last thing he saw was Prowl staring after him, completely and utterly confused.
As soon as they were out of sight, Jazz twisted to bury his face in the floor. "Frag meeeeeeee."
Sideswipe didn't let him go, but he and Sunstreaker coordinated a trade off of legs so that Jazz could continue hiding his face from the world. "You didn't do too bad. It's physically possible for you to have done worse," Sunstreaker said.
Jazz moaned, closing his arms tightly around his helm to shut out the universe. Embarrassment throbbed through him. "That was so stupid. Why'd he have to see that? Why?"
"'Cause the universe hates you," Sideswipe told him.
"Don't I know it."
The twins shook their heads at his misery. Jazz whimpered. After a while, he let his arms trail limply as he knocked his forehelm against the floor in time with muttered self-reproach. He definitely could have handled that better. He wasn't sure how, but gaaaaaah, how humiliating. Sunstreaker and Sideswipe kept hauling him along, but he didn't fight it. If not for his paintjob and occasional self-pitying 'weeeeeh' moan, the people they passed might have thought they were disposing of a corpse.
Eventually, they arrived at the closet, and the two frontliners looked down at him. He sat up, rubbing his scuffed nose. "Did I really do okay?" he asked in a small voice. His visor shone a limpid, earnest blue.
"You didn't ask him out, so I guess you did alright. But I'm not Prowl. Who knows what's okay by his standards." Sideswipe keyed open the door. "Door-to-door delivery, sir! Have a good shift." Hint hint.
Jazz glared into the closet. As promised, there were boxes of tablets for him to work on waiting inside. "I don't wanna go in there."
"Tough. You're gonna go in there. It's where all the files are now, so shoo. Go on."
"But I just…" He heaved a sigh, looking away. He knew what the shift schedule said, and what Ironhide said about people who didn't follow it. That didn't stop him from giving his escorts a pleading look. "Can't y' just…not? Please? I'll be good. I'll stay in the back. He won't even see me. Please?"
"Jazz, seriously. Don't do that." Augh, Bluestreak's wounded cyberpuppy look was easier to bear. Jazz put a quiver in his bottom lip that should be illegal. Nobody so lethal should look so cutely sad.
"Please? Please please? You can sit on me or somethin'. Cut me a break, guys. C'mon, please?"
The begging made them shift uncomfortably from foot to foot. Having an officer grovel wasn't nearly as fun as Mirage's filthy erotica stash had led them to believe. It mostly just sent second-hand embarrassment zinging hot flashes through them.
Jazz begged, "I just want to watch. You can let me watch. I won't be any trouble. Please, guys, please?"
"You're on duty, and so're we," Sunstreaker snapped.
"Right, and nobody off-duty has to give up their free time to mind you," Sideswipe said. "They would, if we let you go. You never learn, Jazz. You do the same rusted thing every time! And with all due respect, sir, you're a sexual harassment case waiting to happen. You walk that line so often Smokescreen's the only one who bets on you slipping off anymore."
Sunstreaker snorted and said, "Get your head screwed on straight."
"I'm tryin'! Frag, you know how much I want to - "
"Whatever. Try harder," Sideswipe said at the same time Sunstreaker said, "How many kicks in the aft do you need? I'll take another month in confinement if that's what it'll take."
"Sir," they both finished.
Jazz looked up at them silently for a minute. To his credit, he turned what they'd said over in his mind, really giving it some thought. "Question," he said after a minute.
"Answer."
"Heh." He rubbed the back of his neck, grimacing a bit at the embarrassment of having to ask. "Um. If I'm a good little 'bot and get in the closet like I should, wouldja consider givin' me a good reference later? Points for good behavior an' all that?"
They stared at him, processors stalling. Today had gone topsy-turvy at some point, if Jazz, spymaster and saboteur extraordinaire, was humbly asking favors. Of…them. The low-ranking frontliner grunt soldiers. The Head of fragging Special Operations was asking them if they'd be his references.
It struck them both as a sign of the apocalypse. Surely the world had gone mad, and doom rode on the horizon.
In the spirit of the end times, Sideswipe shrugged, smiling that manic, careless grin he wore when slag hit the fan in combat. "Sure, why not? You do all your work and don't try to escape, and we'll put in a good word for you. Alright?"
Jazz solemnly nodded. "I'm gonna hold you to that."
Reassuring, that was not. It took them a few minutes to stop staring at the closet door after it closed. Trailbreaker had to poke Sunstreaker in the side to get them to move along and let him guard Jazz.
There was much less fuss kicked up inside the closet this time around. It made Trailbreaker suspicious. It made Smokescreen fear for his life. Sure, now SpecOps respected him for pulling one over on Jazz twice in a row, but what good did respect do him if he was dead?
So Jazz appearing out of nowhere scared the polish off him that night. "Aeeeeiii!"
Bumblebee and Mirage swooped in, ready to intercept, but Jazz merely plopped himself into the Praxian's lap.
'Merely.'
Right, that was sort of like seeing the sky fall. "That doesn't seem physically possible," Bumblebee said to Mirage.
"I know. I can hear his engine racing, but he's not being himself." Mirage eyed his boss. "Are you feeling alright, sir? Have you been drinking heavily this evening? Would you like to take a nice stroll down to see Wheeljack? He can tuck you in for the night once you crash."
"I'm not gonna crash," Jazz hissed at them. He might need to lie down in a cool room to bring his temperature down to safe levels later, but that was later and this was now. Alright, he could do this. Drawing in a deep breath, hands denting his knees from the grip he had on them, he gathered his courage and looked Smokescreen right in the optics. "Smokescreen. Hi."
"Hi?" It was hard to meet Smokescreen's optics when Smokescreen was looking at everyone else as though praying they'd save him. Help.
"How're you?" Jazz was initiating Small Talk Script #6. He could to this. They'd worked on it endlessly.
Smokescreen smiled tentatively. "I'm fine. How are you?"
"I'm-fine," the black-and-white recited. His visor didn't stray from Smokescreen's face. "Isn't-the-weather-nice?"
Autobots all over the messhall watched in vague disbelief as Jazz plowed through the practiced chitchat. Skepticism bombarded him from all sides. His fingers dug little dents into his knees, but he didn't look down at the bumper he was almost pressed against. Determined, he sucked in a deep vent of air and kept his visor steady. He was one of the best of the best of the Autobots. He was calm, cool, and confident. He could do a simple conversational script.
Primus, he could so easily imagine Prowl between his legs, sitting like this.
No! "So!" he yelped. His hands clenched into fists. Time to go off-script. "I - I thought, since y' like games an' all, maybe we could play one sometime?" His smile crumbled around the edges, forced too wide, but it still counted as a smile. It did!
Everyone stared at him.
"Subtle as a sledgehammer," Mirage sighed.
Jazz abandoned any pretense of dignity he had and turned the woeful cuteness up to 11. "I got through asking! I thought the point-a all this was t' have attainable goals. I can do this," he said, desperately appealing to Smokescreen's sense of fair play. "Gimme a chance, and I'll prove this's goin' somewhere. I've gotten better, right? I'm not even - " He gulped, because it was tempting to look down, but if he looked down he'd forget what he'd come here to do. "I'm not gropin' you, or droolin' on myself, or bein' a dumbaft. Am I?"
Smokescreen didn't look happy. That wasn't the expression of someone believing a word Jazz said.
So he called for other people to speak for him. "Just one game?" he said, twisting about to give the whole room a look at his pitiful begging face. Pity him, fraggit!
If anyone thought it was strange an officer was begging permission for an off-duty activity from his subordinates, they didn't act like it. A great many considering looks were exchanged. People jittered their hands in midair, expressions iffy. Maybe yes, maybe no? Sunstreaker and Sideswipe pointedly turned their hands up in a united shrug. That was as positive as they'd commit to.
It was more than he could expect, so Jazz would take it. "I won't say a word t' him if it ain't t' do with the game," he promised, desperate. "Really, I won't!"
"Mmhm."
He knew he'd regret this, he just knew it, but he said it anyway. "What do I gotta do to convince you? I'll do anything - nnnno, whatever you're thinkin', no." Too late. Mirage was already ghosting toward Ironhide's table, and Jazz felt dread settle into his tanks. Mirage had a thing for good manners, and oh frag, Perceptor was heading their way. Science and snobbery were never a combination.
Jazz turned to look at Smokescreen, but the Praxian's sympathetic smile only woke a tiny twinge under the paranoia. "They're going to make me regret this, aren't they?" he sighed.
Smokescreen shrugged, which did interesting things to his chest that Jazz was not staring at. "I already set up the next game night to include you."
"Really?"
"Ironhide has agreed to loan us his liquid nitrogen gun," Mirage announced from behind them.
"Urk."
Perceptor stopped at the aristocrat's side. "I believe I have a tub large enough to accommodate him." Him being Jazz, it seemed, or at least that's what the measuring look turned on the black-and-white seemed to mean. "I recommend beginning the process with him immersed, as constant agitation will prevent a solid freeze. We may have to break surface ice to extract him, however. I must note that although the temperature will drop sufficiently to chill his core down to crystallization levels, perhaps endangering normal functions, unless we continue to immerse him throughout the game, starting from near protective stasis will only keep his engine and central processor units cool for approximately - "
Mirage smiled nastily at his boss. "After he's out, I plan on inserting ice into certain intimate areas and taping them shut."
Perceptor paused. Jazz's visor went so wide it flickered white around the frame.
"That will indeed extend the temperature dampening," Perceptor said slowly. "How, ah…?"
"Ambulon has scans of everyone's equipment for recasting." Mirage waved a dismissive hand. "I shall simply make a mold. Wheeljack has already volunteered. Everything," his optics narrowed to amused slits at Jazz, "is taken care of." He was going to enjoy Jazz trying to hide waves of shivering while playing Prowl. Prongs of ice, right square in the happy places. Yes, he couldn't wait to see Jazz's libido try to get past that.
Jazz bravely grinned. "That's, er, great. Glad we got that worked out. I'll see y' before the game starts."
Mirage cocked his head to the side, smiling. "You might." Or he and his conspirators might sneak up on their boss, truss him up, and dunk him in icy lust-suppressant before he had the chance to hide.
A shiver that had nothing to do with cold went through Jazz. "You're creepin' me out here, Mirage."
"Paint incident. Need I say more?"
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