In the privacy of the commander's office, Jazz let loose with his relief and worry.
"I was worried this would happen," Prime sighed, leaning back in his seat.
"Prowl tried hard to lose everyone's trust,"
"And did an excellent job Prime," Jazz pointed out, "I haven't heard one Autobot say they were sorry he's gone."
Optimus Prime leaned forward and looked him in the optics.
"Jazz, it is vital that you keep this to yourself," he said, low, "No Decepticon can know that Prowl went to Cybertron, or that this was all a setup,"
Jazz nodded.
"Prowl said the same thing Prime...and he refused to let me go with him."
"The plan does not cover two Autobots Jazz," Prime said gently, laying a hand on the saboteur's forearm.
"Elita-One and the other females are heavily involved in this. They are the ones who discovered the situation. They have everything covered on their end. When Prowl returns I will inform everybody of what's going on. But until then, he has simply left the Ark on bad terms, understood?"
"Yes Prime. I don't think that will be hard to keep instigated anyway," the Porsche said disconsolately, thinking of the negative, to put it lightly, attitude most of the Autobots were feeling toward the 'former' second in command.
"Prime...how did you know no one would do him in..." Jazz trailed off.
"I didn't," the Autobot commander said softly, sending a chill through the Porsche.
"Man, that was a big chance," Jazz muttered to himself, glad he'd listened to his intuition in defending Prowl.
"Jazz, you know what a tight grip Prowl keeps on his wits. Elita and I knew he had to be the one."
"Prime...how did he react?" Jazz asked softly.
Prime steepled his fingers.
"Prowl is Prowl, Jazz. He listened. Then he looked at me calmly and said,
'Prime, the needs of the many override the needs of the few, or the one. It's logical. When do I leave?'"
"That's our tactician all right," Jazz grunted, "He would've had a fit if you wanted to send anyone else, but because it was himself he made it sound like a picnic."
Jazz knew how hard it must have been on Prime, to put one of his Autobots -and his friend- in mortal danger.
Prime chuckled weakly.
"When I received the first transmission from Elita and learned what they'd discovered, I was set to tell you all and formulate a plan.
But Elita pointed out the severity of the situation.
It called for stealth, not machismo," Optimus explained.
"Elita and I discussed the possibility of myself being the one to go, but that would have drawn Decepticon attention straight away.
We formulated the idea of an Autobot gradually turning on everyone, up to the point where he wouldn't be missed, when he suddenly "went AWOL" at the crucial time,"
Prime sighed.
"The thing was, none of us could have just picked up and made our way to Cybertron without making the Decepticons suspicious. You know they have audios and optics everywhere...we're lucky to go a week without someone spotting Ravage or Laserbeak in or around the Ark. We had to keep it as real as possible, in case of spies,"
"Tell me about it," Jazz said wryly, gingerly touching his jaw.
"What happened?"
The saboteur explained about Laserbeak, and his and Prowl's "altercation".
"That was perfect; just what we needed the Decepticons to see," Optimus Prime said, almost to himself.
"Prime, this is making me crazy. What's going on? Why did you send Prowl to Cybertron?"
Prime gave a short humourless chuckle.
"Prowl begged me to let you in on this Jazz, he said he wouldn't be able to drive you away.
I thought about it long and hard, discussed it with Elita, and we decided that the fewer Autobots who were in the know the better, the less chance of Megatron getting word of it,"
He looked at the saboteur.
"Prime, please," Jazz pleaded, "I just want to know what it is Prowl's risking his casing for,"
The Autobot commander gazed at him.
"Jazz, Prowl's risking his casing to ensure the safety of all the rest of our casings, here and on our home planet."
Optimus Prime explained exactly how and why.
"Oh man," Jazz whispered in shock. "No wonder Prowl was so adamant about getting to Cybertron,"
"Jazz, Elita and Chromia have everything under control," Prime said, trying to reassure himself as much as the Porsche.
"So...all he needs to do is get to Cybertron over the space bridge, meet Elita-One and the other females, and get back here," Jazz said slowly.
"It may be a little more difficult now Jazz," Optimus Prime said quietly.
The saboteur looked at him.
Prime sighed.
"The other day, when you caught up to Prowl in the desert and brought him back here, was when we had planned for him to get to Cybertron.
Elita and the other females had arranged a diversion to get Shockwave out of the way, so that no Decepticon could know Prowl had met with them,"
"Oh no..." Jazz realized, "And the firefight..."
Prime nodded silently.
"So he could get to the spacebridge," Jazz finished up flatly.
"Oh man, I really messed things up. No wonder Prowl tried so hard to distance himself from everyone. It just took one fool wing-nut to screw everything up!"
"Jazz, Jazz, settle down. If anything, I admire the way you kept sticking by Prowl. His intuition proved correct: he couldn't push you away...and it got to the stage where he begged me to keep you away from him,"
"But I wouldn't stay away from him," Jazz said slowly, pieces falling into place.
"Ironhide told us what Prowl'd said to him..."without even the decency to say it to my face"...oh man. This must have just about killed him Prime," the saboteur realized out loud.
"You're right about that Jazz," Optimus Prime said softly, "It upset him very much.
The first night Prowl was in the cell and I went down to give him an update, I was certain he was going to go to pieces then and there.
I couldn't go over anything with him, he was so upset about hurting you and Ironhide.
'Prime, look at this. After everything I've done, Jazz still put this bookfile together for me,'
That was all he could say, and barely managed to get that out,"
Optimus Prime sighed again, long and loud, and ran a hand over his optics.
"Maybe I was wrong to place all this solely and squarely in Prowl's hands Jazz."
The saboteur suddenly realized just how stressful this was to the Autobot commander.
He tended to forget sometimes that Optimus Prime was mortal too.
"Prime, you know Prowl loves a challenge," Jazz said, trying to smile.
The commander continued studying the slab of polished obsidian that served as a desk top.
The Porsche watched him for an astrosecond, then a new question jumped into his CPU.
"How did you contact Cybertron without Megatron or Shockwave picking up the transmissions?"
Optimus Prime perked up a little.
"We've been bouncing transmissions off an Earth interplanetary satellite. There's an eleven-minute window of opportunity every thirty-eight hours,"
"You planned this with just eleven minutes every day and a half?" Jazz questioned, surprised and impressed.
"Yes. And that's part of the reason Prowl had to behave the way he did for so long," Prime said.
"And the rest was trying to get certain Autobots off his back," Jazz said dryly.
"Well...yes," the commander admitted.
"Man. This is just unreal," Jazz mumbled, getting up to pace.
"Jazz, we can't do anything else until I receive the next transmission. Go and get some rest," Prime said firmly.
The saboteur agreed half-heartedly, then turned back, one burning thought in mind.
"That day in his quarters...I could see someone getting hurt Prime!
What if that rifle of his had fired?"
Optimus Prime silently pulled out and handed him Prowl's spare rifle.
Jazz looked it over, and discovered it was completely powerless and empty of all acid pellets.
"Prowl point-blank refused to aim a loaded weapon at another Autobot,"
Prime said calmly, "I just had to remember to give him back the operational one," he added with a slight chuckle.
"I should have known," Jazz shook his head, wondering how he could have ever believed that Prowl would knowingly and willingly put an Autobot in harm's way.
Prime must have known what he was thinking.
"He really played the part, didn't he Jazz," the commander said softly.
"Man, you have no idea."
X
X
X
X
Jazz paused in his neighbour's doorway, gazing around at the mess.
Now that he looked closely, he realized that everything the tactician had destroyed had pretty much been just junk to start with.
You really did plan it down to the finest detail didn't you man, Jazz thought to himself, No one would think to look closely at the time, so it didn't matter.
He stepped into the room, and saw without surprise that there was a fairly large amount of dried Energon spattered around.
Jazz slowly began picking up his absent friend's quarters, desperately hoping he'd be using it again.
A shadow fell across the open doorway.
"What are you doing that for Jazz?" Tracks sniffed.
Jazz glanced up at the Corvette and wished he could tell him.
Tracks had always held the tactician in high regard.
His level of respect was somewhere near subterranean depths right now though.
"I don't know Tracks...just didn't seem right to leave it like this," Jazz said, sitting back on his haunches.
He found it wasn't hard to sound depressed, given Prowl's current situation.
Tracks softened at his tone.
"This must be so hard on you Jazz," he said quietly, "We've all lost a friend, but the way he treated you-"
Jazz stood up, a piece of jagged, shattered computer console still in hand.
"It was hard man," he said simply.
X
X
X
X
Prowl caught a brief glimpse of the planet as the space bridge cascaded to Cybertron.
The Quantum Trick Road, it had been christened.
Only a handful of Autobots truly understood the astrophysics behind it.
The tactician was one of them, but did not allow himself to dwell on that just now.
Prowl pressed back to wall, drew his rifle, and waited.
When a handful of astroseconds had passed without incident, he cautiously stepped out of the transporter module, fully alert, and glanced around.
The control room was deserted, but the screens and controls flashing and chirping for attention, told him someone -most likely Shockwave- had departed in a sudden rush.
Prowl silently thanked Elita-One and her troops for their efficiency.
He quickly slipped out of the structure and stood for a few ticks, adjusting to Cybertron's gravity, slightly weaker than Earth's.
He looked around.
Dim, half-destroyed, depleted of resources, empty of civilians and under Decepticon rule.
But it was still home.
Prowl identified several structures, pinpointed those missing through destruction, and looked forward to the day Cybertron could be rebuilt and its people free once more.
The tactician spent little more than a few astroseconds on his thoughts before transforming.
He kept to the shadows and made for the rendezvous point.