News
Months passed and Jazz began to grow a little more in wisdom and experience day by day. Maestro delighted in teaching his young protégé all the tricks of his trade, from singing, right down to the creation of songs. Jazz absorbed everything like a sponge, thrilled to the core whenever Maestro taught him something new. Maestro's reward was hearing Jazz sing or hum some tune or the other, for the young mech had a unique and beautiful voice.
There came a day when Maestro took Jazz to meet his friend Wheeljack. When they got to the old shop however, they found it closed and half broken down.
"What happened here?" Maestro asked a bot in one of the neighboring warehouses.
"The owner finally went off the deep end and lost all his money," the other mech said. "Decided to melt the place down and himself along with it."
"What happened to the other robot that was with him? The young one?"
"Last I heard, he was heading to Iacon. Good for him. He was a good kid, didn't deserve the treatment he was getting from that mech."
"Yes, well I hope he makes it. Too bad you couldn't meet him Jazz, I think you would have like him."
"Ah hey, you never know. Maybe we'll cross paths someday."
"Well then, lets head down to The Cube and see what's going on in the rest of Cybertron."
The Cube, which was normally a very quiet place even on a good day, was as busy as a hive of turbomoths around an ener-lamp when Maestro and Jazz walked in.
"What's go them all stirred up I wonder?" Maestro asked.
"I think if we sit down we'll find out soon enough," Jazz said. "Since all these guys are talkin' like nobody's business."
They found an empty table in a corner and sat down. Maestro pulled out some credits and passed them to Jazz.
"Buy three drinks. Two for us and one for whoever we invite to talk to us."
"Sure thing."
Jazz palmed the credits and began to make his way over to the bar counter. When he got back, Maestro had already roped in a volunteer of sorts and was now striking up a conversation. Jazz set the 3 mugs down on the table and sat back down again. Maestro winked.
"Jazz," he said. "This is Tech. He's agreed to join us for a drink and a chat."
"Oh, that's nice," Jazz played along.
"Nice to meetcha," the slightly overcharged, green and yellow bot said, extending his hand.
Jazz shook it. "So, what's all the fuss in here about?"
"You mean you guys aint heard the news?" Tech asked.
"Been a little outta the loop if ya know what I mean," Jazz said.
Tech hadn't the slightest clue what Jazz meant, but nodded anyway. "You know them buncha robots been causing trouble down South? They be calling themselves Icons of Deception, – Decepticons for short – said they were descended from the military hardware of old, and going around bragging about how they conned others into joining them." Tech stopped to take a long swig of his drink.
Maestro and Jazz sipped their own drinks and waited patiently for him to continue.
"Well their leader be saying that Cybertron needs a ruler, and he's it. 'Course everyone laughed at him. Then they started the fighting. Them folk shouldn't have brushed him off so easily. Levatron fell to his group yesterday."
"What!" Both Maestro and Jazz looked up sharply.
"I aint kidding. Once they killed off the opposition, most of the others surrendered. Those who were lucky fled north."
"What do they plan to do next?" Maestro asked.
"They're marching north. They want to take over Cybertron even if they have to do it city by city."
"That's not good," said Jazz. "Aint someone gonna do anything about this?"
"Well all the high-ups from the big cities like Iacon, Polyhex and the lot are holding council up in Iacon tomorrow. Primus only knows how that's going to help us."
Maestro stood up and slapped Tech on the back. "Many thanks for the information my friend. I'm afraid Jazz and I have to be going, but you enjoy yourself alright."
"Yeah sure, was nice meeting y'all."
Jazz and Maestro exited the bar. Once outside, Jazz looked at the old mech.
"I know what you're thinking," Maestro said. "What about Bronze and Orchestra." He sighed. "I tried to talk them out of going Jazz, that day. But they were adamant. I'm afraid we may have to fear the worst. I hope they were some of the few who escaped. Only time will tell, if it tells at all. Come, let us go home."
Time told soon enough…
A message arrived from a thoroughly worn out flier a few days later. After tending to mech till he was well enough to be on his way again, they read Orchestra's letter…
: Maestro and Jazz… I write to inform you that Bronze has been killed in battle. When the Decepticons attacked, Bronze, our new robot and myself, tried to escape, but we were pursued. Bronze gave his life so that we could get away. The new robot and I are trying to make it to Iacon. I send this message to ask for your forgiveness. You were right Maestro, I should never have gone down to Levatron.
I hope you can forgive me enough to grant me one last favor…
As you know, you and I don't have much time left. So I have told my robot to seek out your robot if he cannot make it to Iacon by himself. I beg you Maestro, please tell Jazz not to be angry with him eventhough he may hate me.
Orchestra:
Maestro hurled the datapad to the floor, making it shatter into pieces. Jazz took half a step back.
"Foolish!" he said. "A waste of a good bot's life. I warned her about going down to Levatron, Primus above, why couldn't she listen!"
Jazz placed a hand on the old mech's shoulder. "You tried your best. You talked to both of them, they knew the dangers going in. bronze made his choice."
Maestro nodded in resignation, and stared again at the red marking on his paint. It had been a long time since he'd seen actual color on his body.
Word out of Levatron was that the Decepticons could be identified by a specific purple symbol, so the council of Iacon had declared that every other Automated Robot – or Autobots as they were now being called – would be marked with a red symbol to differentiate.
Officials had come down the previous day from Polyhex and marked the residents of Ferronix, Maestro and Jazz included, but so far, that was all they had done.
Different stories began to surface from the few refugees about what had really happened at Levatron. Some said the Decepticons were cold killers, others said that they had been provoked into a frenzy by those who resisted their presence in the city. Maestro chose not to listen to the random gossip that did the rounds within the bars and neighborhood, and more than once was relieved that his house was situated outside the town. Gossip took a long time to reach them.
Maestro shook his head at the red symbol on his arm.
"It doesn't stand out," he said. "And its so plain. There's no real style to it. Its not worth the effort if you cant add some style to it, you might as well not bother."
"Yes, well style or not its compulsory, unless you wanna be mistaken for a 'Con," Jazz said. "And at least the mech didn't slap it on your chest instead of your arm." He looked at his own symbol that glared back from his chest which made up the hood of his hovercar mode.
"So you're saying I should be thankful for small mercies?"
"Definitely, 'cause there's always the possibility that it could be worse than it already is."
"Interesting logic there lad. And how could it have been worse for you?"
"They could've slapped it on my face instead."
Maestro laughed. "You've made your point. And thank you Jazz, for cheering me up."
"No problem. But hey, I don't want ya to think that I aint mourning for Bronze too, I mean the bot was like a big brother to me." Jazz's face went serious. "And I wish he'd have stayed around longer to teach me a few more tricks. So yeah, I'm pretty bummed about that."
"But why cry when you can laugh right?"
"Exactly."
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A/N: i apologize profusely for the delay... now that i work from my laptop, i've been trying all this while to access my desktop again and retrieve a bunch of fic that i had left on it, including this one.. i was finally successful... so i hope you enjoy this... there's one more chapter left...