A/N: this one is mostly talking and no action, but it should tie a few plot threads together. It's also not been proofed because I'm trying to do twelve things at once so if you spot any glaring errors please let me know and when real life calms down I'll correct them.

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Requiem looked down at his hands, unable to endure the pain on Prowl's face.

"Ya were never supposed to get mixed up in this, none of you." Requiem said quietly, air whistled through his intakes making a mournful sound, as he continued "The plan was for all this to happen out o' ya' sight. I'd have shown up with a few new dents and some more nightmares to start me out o' recharge and ya'd have been blissfully ignorant of why."

Prowl surged to his feet and stormed over to the chair Requiem slouched in, slammed one hand over one of Requiem's arms and grabbed his chin in the other forcing the other mech to look at him

"But why go through it in the first place? For once just give me a straight answer Jazz!" Prowl demanded, anger now the dominate emotion in his voice.

Consternation rippled through the Autobot team, Hound and Ironhide looked at Prowl as if he'd blown his processor. Bluestreak was mouthing silent words optics unfocused in shock; Mirage and Bee were scowling deeply trying to follow the tactician's logic. Ratchet walked to Prowl's side and gently disengaged his hand from Requiem's face.

"Jazz is dead Prowl," Ratchet said compassionately, wrapping an arm around the other mech's shoulder and drawing him away from Requiem. "We saw him die; they have his shell in storage on board remember?"

Requiem closed his optics and let his head fall back against the chair, fluid running down his face. He brought his head up, guilt, regret and resignation written over the plates of his face, he looked Prowl in the optics.

"Because I owed an old friend a life," Requiem dropped his head to stare at the floor and finished "I know ya can't forgive me and I never expected ya to."

"Jazz?" Tracks asked "Are you really Jazz?"

"Yes" the affirmative came from both Pain and Requiem at the same time.

"He is Jazz," Pain continued "or rather an upload of his programming, memories, personality files and a physical transfer of his spark. The body is what ever scrap parts I could get to fit together well enough to function, it isn't going to win any design awards and it isn't going to hold out for much longer but it does allow him to fulfil his function in the team."

"I think you owe us the truth about this affair." Mirage's voice was neutral, no hint of his feeling could be detected and his face was closed.

Requiem gave a short bitter laugh "The truth? Do you trust us enough to believe it when we tell you?"

A deep and uncomfortable silence fell, Requiem sat hunched forward in his chair hands clasped together shoulders up head down. Battle Axe was slumped back in his chair, optics off a feeling of strut deep exhaustion emanating from him. Pain however still sat bolt upright in the hard wooden chair she had chosen, optics staring unseeing at the opposite wall, Prime had to repress a shudder, to him it looked as if she a prisoner awaiting interrogation. Assassin curled her knees up to her chest wrapped her arms round them and rested her chin on her knees optics, off line a bitter smile twisting her mouth. Devastator twisted and twitched on the couch he shared with Assassin, unable to keep still or to meet anyone's optics. Broadcast was gazing at each Autobot in turn, slowly assessing them keeping his own reactions and emotions from display.

Bluestreak suddenly rose to his feet and walked over to Requiem, his face screwed up into a mask of determination. Stopping before Requiem he dropped to his knees and took the other mechs hands in his, he could feel the minute shaking of Requiem's frame through the hands he clasped. After a few minuets Requiem looked up at the mech kneeling before him, Bluestreak's optics were clear and bright, his face determined.

"Yes Jazz. I do trust you. You've never betrayed us, any confidence any of us gave you never went any further. You've been the shoulder so many of us have lent on, the hand that pulled so many of us to our feet when we fell. You've always acted the outrageous clown to help us forget our sorrows, been the smile that reminds us that life isn't all dark, and the quiet strong rock of certainty when all the rest of us wavered and thought about giving up." Bluestreak paused to judge the impact his words were having and then continued, "Time for us to repay the favour and help you. You may not have deliberately involved us in this mess but we're here, and we, I, refuse to let you suffer the consequences of this alone."

The twins shared a swift glance and rose as one coming to a stop on either side of Requiem; he flinched as a yellow and a red hand settled firmly on his shoulders.

"Consider it payback for all the times you've hauled us back into line and knocked some sense into us when we'd gone way off the road." Sunstreaker declared firmly.

"And for all times you stood up for us when we've been accused of stuff we didn't do, and especially for all the times you've played peace broker between us." Sideswipe concluded.

"I thought I'd killed you, that you'd died because I hadn't done my job well enough," Prowl's voice was anguished "I just want to know why you did this to me, to us."

"It begins with a death." Broadcasts clipped tones startled everyone.

"'Cast! No please!" Requiem protested a panicked look on his face.

"They care too much about you to let it ride Requiem." Broadcast jabbed a finger at Prime and Prowl and continued "Those two came charging in without knowing what the pit was going on, no backup and almost certainly no plan." a sweeping gesture of his hand encompassed the rest of the Autobots "And they dropped everything, including protecting Earth and its people from the Decepticons, came a long way across the galaxy and risked getting caught up in our plans just to recover your body. He's right we do owe them the truth."

"If we're going to do this may I suggest starting with introductions?" Battle Axe asked resignedly, on lining an optic in Broadcasts direction.

Broadcast rewarded him with a smug grin and said broadly "By all means, be my guest."

The single optic turned into a full blown glare as Battle Axe hauled himself up in his chair; he kicked a chair towards Bluestreak who was still kneeling in front of Requiem.

"On your knees on the floor is very uncomfortable after a very short space of time kid." Battle Axe said gruffly, and then tapped himself on his chest "Sync known as Battle Axe, by the wrath of Primus commander of the Hell Riders and scout."

As he spoke lines began appearing on this armour, they resolved into the Autobot rank insignia on his right shoulder and the familiar squared of face of their faction symbol. On his chest plate, right over his spark chamber, in the same glistening colour as the name on the ships hull, the image of a burning transformer skeleton welding a large double headed half moon axe cleaved through unseen foes.

Pain's armour began to crawl with the same lines as she dipped her head and said "Shrike known as Pain, medic and interrogator." The burning transformer over her spark chamber dripped energon from its hands as it lent back against a cybertronian caduceus.

"Tick Tick known as Assassin, sniper and weapons specialist" Assassin said, shifting out of her curled up position and into a crossed leg pose, her icon was the same burning skeleton dressed in the robes of death one hand holding a rifle.

Devastator let the lines of rank, faction and personal icon, a burning skeleton surrounded by the burning ruins of buildings; fade into existence before saying "Boom known as Devastator, demolitions and explosives."

"Rib known as Broadcast, communications and system infiltration." Broadcast supplied, his icon was a seated burning skeleton surrounded by sound waves.

Under the combined gaze of the rest of the Riders Requiem slowly raised his head and said "Jazz known as Music Man, saboteur and pilot. But this form is known as Requiem."

"Mirage known as Figment, spy and hunter." Mirage declared giving both real and field name and specialisations.

Bee followed the same formal identifying formula "Bumblebee known as Sting, sniper and scout."

Mirage took up the introductions of the rest of the team, he lent back in his chair when he had finished and looked at Rib.

"It begins with a death." Mirage repeated "Scan's death by any chance?"

A soft hiss of air flowed from Shrike's vents as she said "Yes, it starts with Scan" her optics focused on Mirage and she asked "How much do you know? How much do they know?"

"You split into three teams, you, Jazz and Scan went after an arms factory, the mission went to the unmaker and the station blew up round you. Scan and Jazz were welded together by the explosion, Jazz survived but Scan didn't." Mirage replied.

Shrike nodded sharply and continued "What we actually retrieved was unrecognisable as a transformer; they'd both lost about ninety percent of body mass. By a miracle they were both still alive when we got them to a medical facility, I spent weeks trying to separate them enough to be able to transplant their sparks into holding forms. We were lucky to extract enough of Jazz from the mess to be able to rebuild him; I lost count of the times I nearly lost him on the table." Her optics went dark and her face turned hard and flat "Scan wasn't so lucky; his spark case had suffered heat and shock fractures, it shattered in my hands."

Ratchet closed his optics; he'd lost patients like that. An exposed spark stuttered and slowly faded, it was a long drawn out death, and once the process started nothing in the universe could stop it. As much as he hated the medic for what she'd done to Jazz he could sympathise with her pain at loosing a friend like that.

"Maldor was the one who fired the missile that set the whole thing off." Shrike concluded "He knew what he was doing, I heard him shout at the others to withdraw as he was going to blow the explosives in the next bay."

"He's been popping up here and there ever since," Sync took up the tale, "throwing spanners into our plans as much as he can. Always involved in nasty business, weapons smuggling, drugs running, people trafficking you name it he's done it."

Bluestreak, still kneeling before Requiem said softly "Mirage said you left them, after that mission."

"Yes," Requiem's voice was barely audible, despair, pain and guilt dripped from his voice "I, I couldn't get those last seconds out of my mind. The wall of heat rushing at me, the agony as my skin melted, the feel, smell and sound of my circuits burning it haunted me every second I was online and Scan's screams as he was caught in the blast drove me from recharge." He stopped, shuddering as silent tears rolled down his face.

Bluestreak strengthen his grip on Requiem's hands and moved closer to the distressed mech, Sideswipe dropped into a crouch beside him and wrapped a comforting arm around his shoulders. Prowl gave a shudder of his own in Ratchet's arms, the screaming and calling out Jazz had done in his sleep before all this had gone to the pit suddenly had a much more terrible origin than just the killing and near misses he'd imagined were troubling Jazz.

"Even when I'd recovered physically, I was a liability; I just couldn't deal mentally with the job. I'd killed one member of the team and I couldn't shake the though that I might do the same thing again, I lost all confidence in me." Requiem fell silent and looked into Bluestreak's face his optics begging the younger mech to understand and forgive him.

Bluestreak smiled reassuringly and said "From what I've heard Scan's death wasn't your fault and they" he jerked his head backwards towards the Riders "obviously don't hold you responsible otherwise you'd have been deactivated a long time ago."

Sunstreaker nodded and added "Everyone's entitle to doubt themselves Jazz, even you. And after something like that, frankly I'd be more worried about you if you didn't."

Requiem twisted his head round to look up at the yellow twin over his shoulder, a faint glimmer of hope kindling in his optics at those words.

"You got back into the game at some point." Sideswipe asked from his crouch beside Requiem, "How'd that happen?"

Requiem made a half laugh half sobbing noise and said "By accident, I drifted, after I'd left. No rank, no faction, no nothing really, just me, myself and I. I turned my hand to all sorts of civilian jobs in all sorts of places, but I found I couldn't leave the war behind. Everywhere I went I found myself tuning in to Autobot broadcasts, the local and galactic news trying to keep up with the situation," a faint smile ghosted across his face "I got me into more than one bar brawl over my opinions on the whole thing. So a century or so later, flat broke and working my passage on a shuttle back to Cybertron, I decided that maybe I should stop talking about what I'd do in a situation and restart doing it. I still couldn't bring myself to get back in the game so deep, so I signed on with the regulars as a scout."

Sync made a spluttering sound and tried to drag both optic ridges back down onto his face, and a general sniggering rose from the other Riders.

"You," Requiem said faintly accusingly, glaring at Sync "had dragged my skid plate through enough seek, locate and blow ups that I had more than a little experience at following a trail. And of all people you should know how hard I am to find if I put my processor to it."

Outright laughter followed this statement, and Prime felt his lips twitching into a smile as he recalled several occasions when he'd spent cycles trying to track Jazz down without success only to find him waiting in his office after he'd finally given up.

Requiem blew air through his vents and continued "Trouble was I couldn't just do the scout thing, my past caught up with me and I found myself thinking as a saboteur. Getting inside places and mapping them, taking some out damaging others, turning in really detail plans of places along with a list of ways and means to take 'em out. That kinda thing gets you noticed real quickly, so I found myself assigned to Prime's unit as a saboteur. Back in the game sure, but only on the fringes, and found I could deal with that. I work as a solitaire most of the time, only person who's gonna suffer if I glitch up is me."

"So how'd all this start?" Ironhide asked coldly "You ran into him" he stabbed an accusing finger at Sync "and decided to catch up with old friends?"

"This would be were we take up the story." Rib answered "About two years ago we decided to quit the game ourselves, while we were all still alive and functional enough to enjoy life. Tradition dictates that any team leaving the game on their feet gets one free shot at settling a debt, any team who survives for any length of time has people it owes."

"No need for discussion in our case," Boom interrupted his voice edged with anger "That glitch Maldor had cost us two good Riders, a good many friends and caused us more trouble than any 'con ever managed. We were always going to take him or go down trying."

"Ease off the throttle Boom." Sync warned "We went after Maldor to avenge Scan's death and for revenge for what that death had done to Jazz, who was never part of the plan, we figured he was still safe with you lot on Earth. So slowly, carefully over the space of the year before last we began working our separate ways into Maldor's organisation. It takes time to do this sort of thing properly, time and care, one slip by one mech and we're all gone."

"And he didn't recognise you?" Hound asked incredulously

A thin, humourless smile stretched across Syncs lips and he answered "No, we've never actually been face to face in our proper colours and forms for more than a few seconds before now. So we hid in plain sight, using our skills to further Maldor's schemes, or at least that's the impression we gave. More than one business venture went up in flames thanks to our influence, be it direct sabotage or discrete passing of information to the authorities. And we waited, made ourselves indispensable, dug in deeper and deeper."

"The plan was always to capture him," Tick Tick picked up the tale, "which made things more complicated. A straight forward kill would have been easier, but he deserves to meet the justice of his people. The plans were constantly changing, but then he brought us altogether here. Some big business deal was going sour and he wanted his best 'fixers' to deal with it. The opportunity was just too good to pass up, so we set about making it look like there was a plan shaping up to replace him, the perfect excuse to rig up the extra defences you lot ran into." A wicked grin settled on her face "Of course everyone forgets that defences can be turned either way, the plan fixed on triggering with looked like the plot, setting off the defences to keep out anyone who might get in the way, rig the lower levels to collapse and snatch him in the confusion."

Sync sighed and said "As far as your involvement in this, this is where it really starts. I was out of town making holes in a few escape clauses, no point in taking down the head life form if his lieutenants can step in and pull it back together. "He paused and asked Requiem "You've still got that data chip haven't you?"

Requiem freed a hand from Bluestreak's grasp, reached into a subspace pocket and pulled out a large storage chip, as he went to throw it to Sync a thin trail of smoke curled up from his wrist joint which stopped moving with a wheezing grinding noise.

"Umm Shrike?" Requiem asked staring at his now immovable wrist "How long is 'isn't going to hold out for much longer' actually likely to be?"

Shrike raised an optic ridge and said thoughtfully "Longer than this, would the three of you kindly move so I can run a scan."

As Bluestreak, Sunstreaker and Sideswipe reluctantly moved away from Requiem Shrike's optics began to transform. The outer ring went dark and the middle ring spun ninety degrees so that the faint lines that ran across her optics were vertical. The inner circle split into sections which slid down and under the middle ring allowing a solid deep blue circle to take its place, shutters came down changing her wide round optics into thin oblong slats. She stared at Requiem for a few minuets; the only sign of activity was the occasional change in colour of her inner optic ring.

//Ratchet would you care to offer a professional second opinion?// Shrike asked over a very tight digital link.

//Show me// Ratchet responded, holding his face still with years of practise as the data began scrolling across his optics. //He's leaking internally in most joints, not enough to kill him, but where some of his coolant lines have torn the fluids are mixing and setting locking the joints up. The energon conversion cycle can't keep the acidity level stable resulting in clotting in the minor lines. No more than five hours before we need to put him on full life support.//

Shrike gave an almost imperceptible nod and said aloud "Three hours, after that you're in the bay on support, looks like I did more of a botch job than I thought. Better wrap this confession session up fast."

Sync nodded and continued "I was halfway through scuppering ships when I spotted Jazz about to get an appointment with the smelter, so I hauled his aft out of trouble." He flicked a look between Prime and Prowl before carrying on "let's just say I was, surprised, to find him where he was doing what he was. I told him what was going down and offered him a spot on the team; after all he has as much of a stake in this debt as we do if not more. He agreed and we both came back here."

Requiem looked up from examining his broken wrist and said "The plan was for me to play decoy. I would pretend to be a passer on of information, when we were ready I'd deliberately get careless enough that Maldor found out about what was going on, he'd then send someone out to pick me up, I was always gonna end up in Shrike's hands, but it was only supposed to be a day of not answering questions and maybe picking up a few dents. I'd escape at some point during the night and sabotage the power plus what ever else I could get to while they took care of business upstairs." He paused and looked at Prowl guilt rising in his optics "You turned up at the wrong time, Maldor had people trailing me, when you guys showed up and made a beeline for me, he panicked."

"I had the unmakers own job convincing the freaking out little glitch we should take the three of you alive." Sync muttered "He was all for blowing you into the matrix there and then."

"Well you were evidently your usual charming self," Shrike said pointedly "because the first I know about the change in plans is when the little biological malfunction calls me and drops the whole mess in my hands. So now I need to keep Maldor distracted enough that he doesn't notice what the rest of the team is doing and somehow keep the two of you," she waived a hand at Prime and Prowl "alive and unscathed."

"So, you decided that Jazz was expendable and tortured him just to keep Maldor amused?" Tracks asked horrified.

"Not quite," Shrike replied, unruffled by the looks of pure hatred and outrage being directed at her, "Jazz was the obvious choice for interrogation, not only was he the alleged primary contact for the plotters, he has the necessary training to resist it and I know most of his limits. I could have done a number of much less messy, showy things that would have broken him completely."

Requiem made a sound of agreement and said "At this point I had no idea what the plan was so I just played it as if it were real."

"And was it real, or was it faked?" Hound asked, his processor reeling from what he'd heard.

"It was real, you can fake torture but you need a very good studio set up and a lot of time." Requiem said, looking at Prime he added quietly "I'm so sorry you had to see it, but there was no other way to keep you safe."

"What about the hacking?" Prime asked pain lacing his voice, "That didn't look faked either and yet." He gestured at Requiem as if to say here you still are.

Requiem made an odd sort of half swallowed howl in his throat and shrunk into himself optics offlining. Bluestreak and the twins who had regrouped around him exchanged worried looks and moved closer offering reassurance and comfort silently.

"It was and it wasn't" Shrike said, her face was troubled, "We had you two to worry about and we needed Jazz to blow the power, so I'd been putting together the parts for a temporary frame," she flicked her fingers at Requiem, "but transferring Jazz into it was going to be a problem. We had to convince Maldor the he was dead, it was the only way I'd be allowed to be alone in the repair bay with him, and also we had to stall him demanding that I pick one of you two and see what I could get out of you. The only thing I could think of was to hook up Requiem to full life support and do an uplink load from Jazz into Requiem, shut Jazz down into stasis and then transplant the spark later. One dead Jazz, one living Requiem with the added bonus that Maldor was willing to wait a few days to see what I could get from the allegedly burnt out remains of Jazz's memory before starting the whole process again with a new victim."

Wheeljack and Ratchet were staring at her in disbelief, processing the risks she'd taken pulling off a stunt like that, risks both to herself and to Jazz.

Wheeljack finally unlocked his vocaliser and said faintly, "You used yourself as a router for a full software transfer?"

"Only solution to our many problems." Shrike answered, shrugging her shoulders, "I'd over exaggerated the whole concept of hacking to Maldor, and he was convinced that even if Jazz kept silent you two would spill instantly rather than face the possibility that you'd be hacked as well". A grimace twisted her face "The actual transfer was one of the more, unpleasant, experiences of my life."

"I thought she was genuinely going to hack me," Requiem said "Those goodbyes were for real." A bitter smile crossed his face "I'd accepted I was going to die under torture by that point; I figured that it was some sort of twisted cosmic justice for what I'd done to Scan. It wasn't until she established a connection that I found out what the plan was, and by that time I was in no position to tell you about it."

Bee shook his head and hazarded "So you transferred Jazz into Requiem, code, storage and spark, and then proceeded with the original plan?"

Rib nodded and said "I'd kept an optic on all transmissions made and caught the tape of what had happened on it first broadcast, unfortunately for us Prime your security officer is very, very efficient. He snagged it from the data stream before I could jam it, which led to you lot crashing the party."

"So," Sync said his tone suddenly cold and brisk, the sound of a professional solider determined to see some unpleasant task done as fast as possible "you formally arrested the three of us on charges of treason murder and being an accessory, although how exactly your supposed to be an accessory to your own murder I'm not sure. You've had our confession Prime, time to hand down sentence."

No one moved or spoke for a long time, all optics focused on Prime, who sat chin resting on this chest his optics fixed in a million mile stare.

"I need some time to consider my verdict." Prime's voice was flat, betraying no sign of his thoughts or emotions "What will happen to Requiem when his body give up?"

"Jazz's body shell is on full life support in the repair bay, it needs some work to be habitable again and more much more work before it's going to walk out under its own power." Shrike said calmly, "The necessary equipment to uplink and transfer is built into the bunks."

"You may not have time," Sync said in the same flat voice "Most of your command structure is here, as well as your best front line troops. Megatron may well be stomping all over earth and your remaining crew."

Prime turned his head to stare at Ironhide as the old mech clapped both hands over his mouth and began rocking with laughter, Prowl looked worriedly at Ratchet as he began sniggering and waving a finger at Mirage.

"Ohhh, I don't think we need worry about 'the Lord Protector'. Do we Mirage?" Sideswipe asked sweetly a wide angelic smile stretching from audio to audio.

"No we don't," Sunstreaker added the same smile decorated his face "after all he's 'a noble and honourable warrior', isn't he?"

Requiem looked from one twin to the other, confusion in his optics. Deciding he wouldn't get any sense from them he looked imploringly at Bluestreak, only to be more confused but the fact that Blue had collapsed against his knees and was shaking with laughter.

"Sorry, Prime." Tracks stuttered between sobs of laughter, "we, we didn't, didn't get to the signing ceremony."

Boom looked at the others and then shrugged his shoulders "They've cracked under the strain, only explanation."

Prime, Prowl and the Riders fixed their optics on the only Autobot who wasn't convulsed with laughter. Mirage had buried his face in his hands and was quietly muttering about just what he was going to do to the others when this was all over.

"Mirage?" Requiem asked tentatively "What are they going on about?"

Mirage raised his head opened his mouth to speak, made a series of inarticulate noises and closed his mouth again.

Hound got a brief hold on his mirth and began to hum the funeral march, off key and out of time before giving up to laughter again at the glare Mirage gave him.

"Mirage." Prime growled, "Talk."

Mirage looked Prime squarely in the optics and said in a calm voice "Red Alert isn't the only one good at data capture; Megatron saw the broadcast as well. He offered and I accepted full and formal truce in all places until we had rescued the living and recovered the dead, and completed the rights for Jazz."

Prime stared at Mirage in blank amazement, he couldn't think of a single thing to say. He was brought out of his daze by Tick Tick high pitched shrieking as she collapsed sideways on the couch and curled up in a ball laughing. Boom was soon lying back on the other end of the couch helpless with laughter; Rib's lips were twitching as he struggled to suppress the amusement that snapped in his optics. Requiem and Prowl were staring at Mirage in shock, mouthing silent words as they tried to get their processors round the idea. Prime recognised the hysteria that floated on edges of his CPU the as the release of tension and emotions that had been bottled up for days and gave himself over to it.

"Good job." He managed to get out, silently promising himself he'd get the full story later.

"Perhaps," Shrike said slyly a wicked grin blooming on her face "we should just lock you and 'The Lord Protector' in a room Requiem and leave you to negotiate a peace treaty."

The glare that earned her set them all off, the twins crashing to the floor convulsed helplessly. Prowl removed himself from Ratchet's hold gently propping the wheezing medic so he wouldn't fall over and walked to stand in front of Requiem.

"Look me in the optics and tell me you think it was all worth it." Prowl said, holding out a hand to help Requiem to his feet.

Requiem accepted the hand as Bluestreak obligingly rolled off his knees on to his back on the floor. He stepped over the Datsun and stood before Prowl his mismatched optics glowing with conviction.

"Yes," Requiem said his voice firm "it was. I'm sorrier than you can know that you got caught up in it, but I'd do exactly the same thing again."

"How touching." An unknown voice spoke from the doorway.

Silence fell as everyone froze looking at the man who stood there. Of medium height for a humanoid he had pale waxy skin and his green eyes showed his hatred and contempt of mechanical life forms.

"Maldor." Sync hissed.

Maldor smiled mockingly and said "Thank you so much for the fascinating story but now I think it's time to execute the sentence for treason and murder."

He raised the arm that until now had been hidden behind him, the solid shot pistol that he held discharged three times.

Three energy weapons discharged and Maldor fell senseless to the deck.

All three solid rounds hit their target, and Requiem fell silently his chest and face torn open energon and fluid pumping over the deck.