Chapter 53

'on the edge'

Soundwave stared at Blaster, looking as real and solid as any day in the past thousand vorns in which Soundwave had faced him on the battlefield. Instinctively he sent commands to prime the rifle on his shoulder, but when he gripped the barrel to adjust aim Blaster just rolled his optics.

"Primus, Soundwave, put that away. What do you think you're gonna do, shoot me? I'm dead." He snorted and turned away, shoving his rifle carelessly aside as he did so. "And our builders thought you were the smart one. Sheesh."

Soundwave nearly stumbled back from the casual push, spark spinning madly in his chest. Blaster, a dead mech, had just touched him, and with a strength he'd never shown in his own mortal body. Alarm prickled up and down his struts.

"Reason for Blaster's presence?" he asked cautiously.

"Oh gosh, I am rusty in my Soundwave-ese," Blaster drawled. "Does that mean 'how can you be here, Blaster?' or 'why are you here, Blaster?' I'll assume it was the first one. I'm here because you're in Jazz's mind, and right now he's more on my side of the Well than yours. Busy dying, and all that."

Fists clenched at his sides. "Soundwave will not allow Blaster to take Jazz."

"Take him? You really are an idiot. Jazz is my friend, do you think I want him to die? You self-absorbed walking dial tone, I'm not here to stop you from saving Jazz's life, I'm here to help you." His vents huffed scornfully.

"Possibility to save Jazz… exists?"

"Maybe," Blaster replied, casting an arch look back at Soundwave. "Depends."

Soundwave was almost afraid to ask. "Factors?"

"Whether you're capable of learning anything. You know, from the last time you tried to keep someone alive."

The words were so casually sharp that Soundwave recoiled, spark crushing under the unexpected pain. Blaster didn't miss the way he flinched, one corner of his mouth pulling up in a humorless grin. "Hurts, don't it?"

"Blaster, angry?"

"That Aerosmith wimped out in the nineties? Yes. At you? Not like how you think I am. Hell, you're the reason I'm still here, hovering on the edge of the Well like this. I couldn't go all the way in, not without knowing what happened to my little guys. So I stayed, and I watched. I watched every minute of it."

"Soundwave, tried -"

"Don't I know it," Blaster said flatly. "You left no stone unturned, no night cycle fully slept through, no cassettibot not rocked into recharge."

"Soundwave, failed."

"That too. And it was even worse from where I stood. Can you imagine what that was like, watching them fall into death one after another? Not fighting, not even trying, until every symbiote that I'd just spent centuries protecting was dead. And I couldn't do fuck-all about it."

"Soundwave, desired alternate result," he pleaded.

"You and me both." Blaster curled his fist and held it to his chest glass, bowing his head in brief silence. At that moment Soundwave sensed something almost like his own awareness of his cassettes in the physical world, the presence of four tiny sparks softly glowing within.

"You couldn't save them," Blaster murmured, just as Soundwave had begun to tremble. "And I should have moved on after they joined me. But by the time I could -I couldn't. Because, fraggit, I was worried about you. Soundwave, the monotoned icebox, the mech I spent my whole life hating. Worried." He snorted softly and shook his head.

"After they were gone, all you could do was punish and hate on yourself. You were sinking hard and you were taking your cassettes down with you. Then Jazz happened - as he does - and the sinking stopped. Still couldn't leave though, oh no. By then I was well and truly hooked. I had to see for myself where this would go, if it would turn into the colossal shuttlewreck that I knew it would. I was mostly right. You and Jazz are just about the least two compatible mecha in the whole universe."

"Blaster, not lost penchant for talkative behavior," Soundwave observed irritably.

"The problem, you see," Blaster continued, as if he hadn't heard, "is that you fell in love with a mech who doesn't know how to love you back. Not you or anyone else in his long, miserable life. He's everybody's friend, our Jazz, but only the young and stupid try to love him. The rest of us settled for a romp in the berth and thanked Primus that he picked our side of the war. You, Soundwave, have learned well enough by now what he's really like. Believe me when I tell you that holding a knife to the throat of an unconscious cassette is the least of it. After all that, everything he's done to you tonight, do you really still love him?"

Soundwave hesitated, considering the question anew in the wake of this horrible night. "Soundwave… angry. But, not ready to lose him. Jazz, must be alive."

"I think so too. Sadly for all of us, you're the one that came to save him, so our chances aren't great. Work with what the world gives you, I guess."

"Soundwave," he informed Blaster frostily, "prepared to do anything necessary to prevent Jazz's death."

"I doubt it. But you're the one that's supposed to be honest, so we'll see." He shrugged and tipped back to lean against the nothingness behind him, easily as if there were a solid wall. Soundwave was being reminded more and more why he'd always loathed conversing with Blaster, and struggled to keep patience.

"How?"

"Well first of all we have to find him. That's a whole lotta empty out there but it's all in the bait. A little Michael Jackson, I think, should do the trick." Human music trickled out of his speakers, ratcheting up in volume by the second until - curiously enough - Jazz actually appeared. It was impossible for Soundwave to see where he came from, but he simply wandered in out of the black looking, understandably, rather dazed. His visor blinked a few times before managing to focus on the source of the music.

"B- Blaster?" he whispered, and got a cheerful wave in return.

"Jazz! Get your aft over here and say hi to a mech!" He opened his arms wide and Jazz threw himself into him, laughing with giddy relief.

"Jazzman!"

"My Jukebox Hero!" They parted so they could engage in some complicated ritual handshake, then came together again for one last fast hug. Somewhere behind him, Soundwave thought he heard a distant noise, maybe a snatch of music. He tilted his head, but the sound was already gone. "Mech, what are you doing here?"

"Better to ask what you are doing here, my friend. Getting caught flat-footed by Megatron?" Blaster clucked his glossa disapprovingly. "Very sloppy, Jazz. That's the kind of thing that'll get you killed. And did."

Jazz groaned, mostly in disgust. "I was distracted. And it was a long night. Long year. I was trying to pull off the perfect escape, but there were just too many moving parts. Too many surprises, even for an escape artist genius like myself." If he noticed the way Blaster rolled his optics at Soundwave, he didn't show it. For that matter, if he'd noticed Soundwave at all he hadn't given any indication. "I tripped, I fell. That was that. It was probably inevitable that I couldn't pull it off without at least one casualty anyway."

-on top of the world and the next it's fallin on me- This time Soundwave knew he heard it, thin music circling somewhere around them in the oblivion. It was nowhere near the volume usually playing in Jazz's mind, but it was there. -a far cry from the world we thought we'd inherit, it's a far cry from the way we thought we'd share it-

Blaster looked like he'd heard it too. "Maybe 'that' doesn't have to be that," he said.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean: look." He took Jazz's chin in his hand and turned his head to look straight at Soundwave, and it worked. Blue light blanched to white when Jazz finally saw him, armor plates bristling instinctively.

"You," he choked. "What are you doing here- what is he doing here?"

"Same reason as ever, Jazz," Blaster said calmly. "He's here for you. He came here to save your life."

"I thought you said I died!"

"Your body did. Megatron's shot went through most of your core systems and pierced your spark casing, so it stopped spinning. But it hasn't gone out, not yet. And that's what's keeping some of your neural functions online. You still have a mind for Soundwave to visit, Jazz. All you have to do is go with him, back out into the world, and you can live!"

Jazz looked at Blaster, contemplating that for about one astrosec, then pointedly turned his back on Soundwave. "So. How's the afterlife? Do I get to haunt anyone? Can I haunt Starscream?"

"Oh come on, Jazz," Blaster huffed. "I just told you -"

"That I have to go with Soundwave. Well that's not going to happen. I've just spent the last year of my life scheming in every conceivable way how to make the exact opposite of that happen. So sorry you wasted your time -" This he said over his shoulder, in Soundwave's vague direction. "- except not really. You can run along back to Megatron now."

"Jazz!"

"Can't hear you over the Springsteen!" Jazz assured Blaster, the music around them upping itself to what was close to Jazz's normal volume. With casual ease he moved into his usual twisting and skipping motions. "Get it? Because I'm 'dancing in the dark'."

"Jazz, there is no dancing in the Well," Blaster snapped, and that seemed to at least get a flicker of his attention. "There is no music. No parties, no jokes, no games. It's just… quiet, forever. You turn away from life now, you turn away forever. No second chances. Are you really going to refuse the world?"

"But I have to go back with him."

"So? You just have to let him bring you back, not marry him."

"Actually, no, or did you miss that bit earlier? He threatened me. He told me that wherever I go in this universe, he will follow. No matter how far I run, he will keep coming to catch me and put me back in his cage. That is the kind of life I can look forward to if I go back. So thanks, but no thanks. Now don't you have to guide me into the Well or something?"

"I'm not here to guide you to a goddamn thing," Blaster said flatly. "I'm the bouncer."

"Oh shut up. What do you think you're going to do, throw me back out into the world because 'it's for my own good'? Like you even know what it was like, what he's put me through!"

"I know exactly what he's put you through, handfeeding and all." He slid a sideways glance at Soundwave and added a very snide, "Classy." To Jazz, he went on: "Not only have I been watching, I was there. I came to you in your recharge. Takes some work, but if I try hard enough, I can trigger memory file recall during defragmentation."

"My dream," Jazz whispered, surprised and more than a little discomfitted. "That was you?"

"I had to try. The night you learned the truth, I had to help you get past it. Not for your sake, but for his. He already hated himself so much; I couldn't let you hate him too."

"Touching," Jazz remarked sourly. "You hid all this affection for him very well when you were alive, B. Well don't let me stop you, go on, follow him out of here and enjoy the honeymoon."

"That option isn't open to me, or anybody else here. Just you."

To that Jazz just shrugged and turned his back. BUT YOU CAN'T HAVE IT HERE, AND I WON'T LET YOU STEER. YOU KNOW I DON'T WANT YOU IN MY MIND!

"Blaster, did same for me," Soundwave murmured, keeping his voice low, quietly reeling from this last revelation. "Initiated memory file playback during recharge."

"Yup, sure did."

"Blaster also spoke. Declared Jazz would never be mine."

"Meant it too. But never mind that right now, I'm working on Jazz. And as usual, he doesn't want to play by the rules. Lucky for you, I happen to be fluent in the one language Jazz can't lie in." He pointed up into the darkness where a human still sang. IT'S GONNA TAKE A HUNDRED THOUGHTS TO MAKE THIS ONE DISAPPEAR. A TRAIN LIKE THAT COULD TRAVEL A SOUL FOR YEARS, A TERRIBLE THOUGHT COULD HAVE A TERRIBLY LONG CAREER.

Jazz had wandered a few steps away, but seemed to have lost his mood for dancing. Instead he was learning Blaster's trick of moving about in this space, swinging himself up to sit on the edge of nothingness. Defiantly he faced away from them, kicking his legs back and forth. Humming along deep in his vocalizer, Blaster wandered closer.

"So, what was Plan A, Jazz?"

"What?"

"Well, I know you weren't expecting Megatron to haul you into his berth and then keep you for the night, so how were you really going to get away? What was the great escape's Plan A?"

"More like plan Z and a half, by now," Jazz mumbled. "I was going to keel over from a sudden cramp in the fuel tank. Soundwave would blame the energon treats from Mixmaster and take me straight to the Constructicon medbay, just before the rain set in. While we were stuck there, he'd get served the same drugged energon Hoist and Grapple were giving to the rest of the gestalt. I'd take their shuttle to HQ and bring unconscious Laserbeak with me, just in case any of the other cassettes noticed he'd gone down and came poking around."

"Smart plan."

"Thank you it was," Jazz sniffed. "Why do you ask?"

"Oh, no reason." But the music had changed while Jazz was talking, and Blaster was listening intently to it. TAKE ME HOME TONIGHT, I DON'T WANNA LET YOU GO 'TIL YOU SEE THE LIGHT! TAKE ME HOME-

"Oh my sweet Primus," Blaster whispered, optics dilating wide and fixing their shocked stare on Jazz. "You wanted to take Soundwave."

"Wh- no I didn't!"

"Eddie Money don't lie," Blaster said matter-of-factly. "You wanted to take him with you after it all went down; you thought you'd take him over to the Autobot side - him and his whole entourage. You wanted him to defect, get hired by the Bots to fill my spot, and then you and all his team could live together: one big happpy family."

Stunned, Soundwave stared at Jazz, who was leaning back into his palms with his most nonchalant of poses. "That's the dumbest theory I've heard all week, Jukebox. You know committment is not my style. You see, I'm a cowboy. On a steel horse I -"

"Don't you try to Bon Jovi me, mister! I invented Bon Jovi. And you, you wanted to keep Soundwave. When did that happen?"

Quite clearly against Jazz's will, the music changed again. OH WHAT A NIGHT! HYPNOTIZING, MESMERIZING ME; SHE WAS EVERYTHING I DREAMED SHE'D BE. SWEET SURRENDER, WHAT A NIGHT!

"The night of the party," Blaster realized, nodding to himself and pretending not to see the horrified look on Jazz's face. "Makes sense. All your friends turned against you, you were humiliated and alone. And there was good ol' Soundwave, solid as a rock, telling you things like 'Soundwave yours'. That's the night the game got real. You stopped calling him 'my love' because it wasn't really a joke anymore, was it? Did you fall in love with him?"

"I don't love anyone!" Jazz snarled, leaping to his pedes and looming dangerously close to Blaster. Unfazed, Blaster didn't twitch. "I use them. And when I'm done, I walk out the door - no thank yous no goodbyes. Like tonight, you might notice. Whatever you think you hear in that music, you have to admit I was not taking Soundwave with me."

"Good point. What made you change your mind?" Soundwave was learning to appreciate Blaster's technique. Every direct question provoked a new change in the music, before Jazz even had a chance to open his mouth. MASTER OF PUPPETS, I'M PULLING YOUR STRINGS! TWISTING YOUR MIND AND SMASHING YOUR DREAMS. BLINDED BY ME, YOU CAN'T SEE A THING; JUST CALL MY NAME 'CAUSE I'LL HEAR YOU SCREAM.

"So it was Megatron," Blaster translated. "After what he did to the both of you, you were too angry to even think about it."

"And why shouldn't I be angry? Soundwave led me by the hand into the lion's den, watched him rape me, and did nothing!"

"Oh c'mon, Jazz. You're not even close to that stupid, that you think Soundwave could defy Megatron like that. Interesting that you got so angry, though. You got triple fucked by the seekers for years, and you don't care. You're even ready to leave the planet in Starscream's hands. Why is it different for Soundwave?"

KIBOU NI MICHITA ZETSUBOTO WANA GA SHIKAKERARETERU KONO CHANSU. NANI GA YOKUTE WARUI NO KA? KOIN NO OMOI TO KURAMITAITA.

"Japanese jazz, clever, but that's okay, I still get it. It's because you trusted him, you let him in. Soundwave got further to knowing the real you than any mech ever has, and your reward was a threesome with Megatron."

"It's really great that you're telling me all this," Jazz said tersely, "like I didn't just live it."

"You're angry with Soundwave because you love Soundwave. You're hurt. But you won't admit it because that would be admitting that the untouchably callous Jazz can be hurt after all, and then you might actually be just like the rest of us."

"I am not like anyone."

"And thank Primus for that. But there just might be hope for the universe after all. It's weird, right? To be part of a family? They love, and trust each other. They'd never part with each other, and they're okay with that. I think you learned to like being part of the family."

"I don't need to hear this shit," Jazz snapped, his patience gone. "Where's Optimus, anyway? I want to see him. Optimus!" Jazz whirled around and started calling into the dark, but Blaster just sighed.

"You can't, Jazz, he's not here. He is, as they say, one with the Matrix. And he just found a new recruit."

"Ugh, don't remind me. Speaking of fumbling in the dark."

"I think he's cute. In a puppyish sort of way."

"The Autobots don't need a puppy, B."

"Do you think Optimus was already the wise and fearless leader we know when he first put his hands on that Christmas ornament?" He paused when that comment kicked up new music in Jazz's mind. WHAT CHILD IS THIS, WHO LAID TO REST, THAT I NOW FIND HERE SLEEPING? DO ANGELS KEEP THE DREAMS WE SEEK, WHILE OUR HEARTS LIE BLEEDING? "I get it now, why the Matrix chooses the way it does. It doesn't look for power, power it's already got. It looks for kindness. That's why it rejected Megatron, and that's why it practically jumped into the hands of that kid. Can't add two and two, I know, but he's got a good spark. Only wants to do the right thing - sorta like someone else we know."

TELL ME HOW MANY TIMES CAN THIS STORY BE TOLD? AFTER ALL OF THESE YEARS IT SHOULD ALL SOUND SO OLD, BUT IT SOMEHOW RINGS TRUE IN THE BACK OF MY MIND, AS I SEARCH FOR A DREAM THAT WORDS CAN NO LONGER DEFINE.

Jazz had gone quiet, but for the music, arms wrapped around himself in an unusual display of vulnerabiity. Blaster lowered his voice. "You really cared about Optimus, didn't you? So much for the use-em-and-lose-em lifestyle. It was his relentless speechifying about freedom, I know, that's what had you hooked. You might not think you're very good, Jazz, but you are good at finding good people. Is there that much difference from committing yourself to Optimus, than to a family?"

"Yes," Jazz snarled, raw anger flashing across his visor. "Yes if that family thinks they own you! If every day you have to stay trapped in those walls while they can go in and out, they never let you alone, never let you have a life - or a future. If that's what it means to be in a 'family', then count me out."

"Of course that's not what it means," Blaster said mildly. "Soundwave's just a little more fucked up than the rest of us. He has a hard time letting go - like right now, for instance. He's fighting to hold you back from death while he lies unconscious in the middle of that battle you just left."

That took Jazz by surprise, and he looked at Soundwave in spite of himself. "You're lucky Ironhide hasn't put a shot right through your head. The second he notices you, he will."

"This risk, known," Soundwave admitted. "Jazz, more important."

"Hey, see that?" Blaster said quickly. "Hmm? That's good, right? See how much he cares?"

Jazz hesitated, then just shrugged again. "We all know Soundwave will go the ends of the universe for his 'things'. Color me unimpressed."

A hard look crossed Blaster's optics, and he frowned. "Jazz, you have many charms. Your arrogance is not one of them. You have two mechs here, one dead and the other very likely to join him, trying to save your life and all you can do is act like you don't care."

"Because I don't."

"I think you wish you didn't. But the truth is that you're terrified of Soundwave - what he feels for you and what you feel for him. It scares you so much that you'll run and hide in death rather than face up to it. It's all right there in the Paul Simon!"

"Shut up, just shut up!" Jazz pleaded, backing away from Blaster. "I can't listen to this anymore!"

"I saw you, Jazz." Relentlessly Blaster closed the distance Jazz was trying to put between them. "I watched you tell Soundwave that my cassettibots made the wrong choice, you told him they should have picked life. You were right, but did you mean it? Cuz now's your chance and you are refusing to take it. Step up! Make the choice that they didn't and live."

In the face of Blaster's blazing determination, Jazz wilted. Blue light waned, and his shoulders sagged as if the world had just dropped onto them. "I'm tired, Jukebox. It's been such a long lifetime. I don't think I have the energy for any more."

"What? What kind of talk is that - what about the Autobots? They need you."

"They have their 'savior' again."

"Yeah, and how many times did you save his life tonight? He'll need you; he'll be lost without you."

"I can't," Jazz croaked. "I can't do it, and fend him off too. I'm not strong enough. I can't play the game anymore."

"So… we just make Soundwave promise to leave you alone."

EVERY BREATH YOU TAKE, EVERY MOVE YOU MAKE. EVERY BOND YOU BREAK, EVERY STEP YOU TAKE, I'LL BE WATCHING YOU.

"You're right," Blaster sighed, "he won't." Wearily he tipped back and looked at Soundwave in a resigned sort of way. "I guess this is where the unstoppable force bangs up against the unmovable object. Jazz won't live unless you let him go, and you could no more do that than stop living."

While he talked he wandered back over to Soundwave until he was facing him directly, arms crossed. "I know better than most what drives you, Soundwave. We were cut from the same code after all."

"Blaster understands demands of core programming," Soundwave pleaded. "Our kind, built to protect and nurture, not to abandon."

"I do. But somehow I managed to make it work, living with the Autobots. Somehow I managed to have relationships that didn't involve me chaining my berth buddies to the actual berth. So you can't blame it all on the code. Seriously, mech, what's wrong with you? Is it because you spent half your life following a mech like Megatron? He looks at the galaxy and sees nothing wrong with the idea of conquering it. But you know better. We adopt our cassettes because they want us to, and when we do, they don't 'serve' us; we work together. Megatron likes to hurt what he owns - you've watched him do it for a thousand vorns. But we don't hurt our symbiotes, we don't hurt what we love."

All this repeated mention of Megatron was tugging at Soundwave's already strained loyalty protocols. Again he thought of the battle he'd left behind, leaving Megatron alone to face the entire Autobot army.

"Battle, still ongoing?"

"It's only been a few astrosecs. Time passes… kinda differently here on the edge of the Well."

"Megatron, alive?"

Blaster hadn't even had a chance to open his mouth before Soundwave was blindsided on the right, Jazz's whole weight slamming into him and fists railing against his armor plating everywhere at once.

"I can't believe you," he snarled. "After everything he did to me! After everything he's ever done to you, you can still bother to care about that thing - that, that toxic cancer on this galaxy! He's done nothing but use you!"

"Megatron, my leader," Soundwave protested, backing out from under the assault.

"Is that why he dragged you into his berth, why he raped you for no other reason than to show off?"

"And you tried to protect him," Blaster murmured.

"I felt sorry for him! I've only been Megatron's slave for six years, but he's had a leash around Soundwave's neck for most of his lifetime. He won't fight back, he won't defend himself. He'll just keep working all his days to keep Megatron's empire running, unthanked, doing everything he can to support the mech who does not love him back!"

Blaster's gaze snapped back to Jazz with laserlike focus. "What?"

"Nothing!" But some new music was blaring overhead and Blaster hadn't missed that either.

"Megatron is the mech who does not love Soundwave back," he repeated carefully. "Are you the mech that does?"

Haughtily Jazz crossed his arms and looked away. "If I did, it'd be nothing but a waste of energy for a mech who'd rather kneel to Megatron on broken glass. He'd never leave him, not even to save his own life."

Soundwave stiffened and Blaster, who'd spent his whole career squaring off against Soundwave at the negotiating table, saw it. "Soundwave? What is it?"

"Soundwave… strongly dismayed by Megatron's actions earlier. After returning home, Soundwave -" His vocalizer hitched and he had to reboot it. "- momentarily contemplated departure from Megatron's rule."

Blaster's mouth fell open. "Shut the front door. That must have given you a fragging stroke!"

"Affirmative," Soundwave said simply, sneaking a quick look at Jazz while he did. Jazz was staring at him, visor a blank pale blue, and he couldn't read anything about that expression. He wished he knew the meaning of the new music around them, and was going to ask Blaster but Blaster beat him.

"So, what does this mean? Are you, like, ready to quit the Decepticons?"

Again his loyalty protocols twinged, and reflexively Soundwave put a hand to his chest. But there was no cascading failure this time, no imminent blackout. Perhaps because he wasn't technically in his own body, he was avoiding the operating code crash.

"Blaster, Megatron alive?"

"It just so happens that I know, but I'm not going to tell you." Briefly Blaster smirked. "Why should I make it easy for you? Jazz doesn't want to know that you're ready to leave Megatron only if he's dead. It's time to decide, Soundwave: will it be Jazz or Megatron? You can't walk the middle path anymore."

"Blaster knows loyalty coding," Soundwave reminded him rather desperately. "Soundwave, served Megatron for so long; bond cannot be broken."

"You've spent the last year telling Jazz that he has to give up on his life and belong to you. What's the difference?"

Without warning he snagged Soundwave by the edge of his plating and pulled him close, dropping his voice to a whisper. "I meant what I said in the dream, Soundwave. He'll never be yours. He won't stand to be 'yours'. But he could be with you, free and equal, if you could just bend yourself enough to try. It'd have worked on my bots if you'd tried, but you didn't, so here we go again. You said you'd do anything to save Jazz - anything. Did you mean it? Or were you lying for the first time in your life?"

He released Soundwave with a small shove that sent Soundwave stumbling, and again he looked back to Jazz. Still he was staring. Soundwave took a cautious step toward him, but the only response was for Jazz to back hastily away.

"It comes," he said slowly, "to this: Jazz must choose between death and life. Jazz, wants to live?"

Fresh music began to play, and Blaster opened his mouth to translate. "He wants -" Soundwave held up a hand, no longer interested in interrogation. This time it was his turn to speak.

"Jazz, will only choose life if Soundwave chooses Jazz over Megatron. And such a choice, impossible. This much considered: Soundwave never understood your difficulty in losing freedom. Now, this difficulty understood." He reached for Jazz but Jazz flinched backward, and Soundave's spark ached to see it.

"Please."

That got his visor to flare even whiter with surprise; Soundwave had never said please to him before. He didn't say it to anyone in his household. "The future, not known. Megatron's survival, uncertain. But whatever happens, understand this: Jazz… not mine."

"Wh-what?"

"Jazz, must live. And so, Soundwave must choose Jazz, not Megatron. Without Megatron, Jazz will have freedom; therefore, Jazz will choose life. This conclusion, only logical. However…"

His hand was trembling slightly when he held it out to Jazz again, not in command, only invitation. "If Jazz will- will choose to be with me, then your company gratefully accepted."

He couldn't tell whether Jazz looked ready to fall over or just fall to pieces. He just kept staring, so stunned, and Soundwave did not think there was any more he could say. A new song began, and off to his side he heard the soft surprised hitch in Blaster's ventilations.

SO WHEN YOU SENSE A CHANGE, NOTHING FEELS THE SAME. ALL YOUR DREAMS ARE STRANGE; LOVE COMES WALKIN' IN. SOME KIND OF ALIEN WAITS FOR THE OPENING, THEN SIMPLY PULLS A STRING; LOVE COMES WALKIN' IN.

Jazz's hand dropped into his, light as ash, the mere contact sending crackles of electricity straight up Soundwave's arm and into his spark. As if it were the most natural thing in the world Jazz spun into the crease of his arm and up against his chest plating. "B always did love Van Halen the most," he murmured.


Soundwave woke up into the darkness, rain still thrumming against the shattered remains of Decepticon Command but no more sounds of battle. He was still where he'd dropped off from reality, lying unnoticed in the shadows, Jazz cradled in his arms. He was still unconscious, visor black, but now Soundwave could feel the unmistakeable rhythm of his spark spinning steadily - if slowly - in its chamber.

He did not let himself look at anything else. He only sliced into the Autobots' comm channel, easy enough task for a signals expert tracking a group no longer trying to hide. He broadcast his position and Jazz's status, then waited. It was not a long wait.


Disclaimer: I do not own these characters