Title: Overcharged
Author: zea_taylor
'Verse: G1
Rating: T/PG-13
Characters: Jazz/Prowl (established), Beachcomber
Warnings: mild Cybertronian profanity, Cybertronian drunkenness
Author's Note: Another written for the prowlxjazzcommunity's Anniversary Bingo Challenge, back in Generation 1. Inspired by a prompt posted by wicked3659. Set on Earth, fairly early in the cartoon continuity.
Comments and suggestions for improvement are always very welcome!
Prompt: Overcharged
"I'm telling you, Prowl, it wasn't us!"
Sitting behind his office desk, Prowl raised a sceptical brow-ridge. He studied the two front-line warriors in front of him, giving them time to absorb the full force of his irritation.
"Three mini-bots over-charged on duty," he recapped. "Two of the three subsequently confined to medbay." He scowled, shaking his helm. "I have checked Teletraan-I's records. All three drew their standard allocated ration of energon – or less – over the last two orns."
Sideswipe scowled back, unable to argue with those facts. Sunstreaker just shrugged, indifferent.
Leaning forward, Prowl steepled his servos in front of him and let his weary frown show.
"The only logical conclusion is that elicit high-grade production is once again underway on the Ark. Tell me, Sunstreaker, Sideswipe, given your record to date, why should I believe you aren't involved?"
Sideswipe's look of outraged innocence was half-way convincing, but it was Sunstreaker's scowl that did more to convince his commander. The yellow-clad mech snorted, his disdain intensifying as he noticed Prowl's scrutiny.
"You think we'd waste our brew on Gears and Huffer? It's hardly worth the effort, even if we'd lost our fragging processors and wanted to. Most minibots don't have the energon capacity of a half-grown youngling."
By Sunstreaker's usual taciturn standards, the rant was unusually outspoken. The front-liner's optics were brighter than usual, his stance aggressive. For just a moment, as Prowl rubbed his brow-ridge, he wondered if Sunny might be overcharged too, but even the Twins had better sense than to report for duty in such a state.
Shaking his helm Prowl sat back in his seat. Illogical as it seemed, he actually found himself believing the troublesome pair in front of him. He fixed them with a stern look nonetheless, even more concerned than he had been before.
The twins were mischievous, but never stupid. He couldn't say the same for every other member of the Ark's crew. If someone else was brewing up high-grade on the sly…? It was worrying, and depressing at the same time. Not for the first time he questioned why he was bothering with an army that seemed determined to implode upon itself at the slightest provocation. Venting a frustrated sigh, Prowl raised a servo to mask his faceplates for a few klicks. He didn't need this.
"I expect you to report any evidence of misconduct immediately, understood? Wheeljack's new geothermal condenser is improving our energon situation, not resolving it. While I understand that the product is not to every taste, we are not in a position to be choosy. If we are to bring out remaining crewmates online, it is vital that we conserve – "
"Ahh…" There was a bemused expression on Sideswipe's face as he interrupted his commander's stream of words. "Uh, we know? You told us that three breems ago. Prowl, are you okay? You're looking kinda… tired."
Prowl rubbed his brow-ridge again, and only realised he was doing it when he saw Sideswipe's optics following the movement. His door-wings flared in surprise, and that got a frown from his audience too.
The warrior was right. It wasn't like him to be this demonstrative, or to feel this weary, even so late in the day.
He straightened, deliberately raising his door-wings to their usual erect position. Maybe he was tired. He never recharged well when Jazz was away on a mission. Jazz… he wished his companion was back on the Ark and by his side now. Jazz could handle the twins as well as Prowl could, and with less aggravation all around. Oh yes… the twins.
Prowl shook his helm, dismissing his wandering thoughts.
"You may go," he said, shortly, and the pair didn't wait for him to change his mind.
Venting a sigh, Prowl let the door slide shut behind them. For a few klicks, he dropped his face-plates into his servos, trying to fight his unaccustomed sense of being overwhelmed and exhausted by the Ark's usual chaos. For the second time in as many minutes he wondered why he kept going, and what there was for him beyond the endless round of duty, destruction and drudgery.
The answer came to him before he had time to dwell on the question, and with it the image of a frown on familiar faceplates: Jazz. It wasn't long now before the saboteur was due back. And he'd have Prowl's plating if he saw the tactician in this state.
Raising his helm, he pushed up from his seat. Technically he'd been off-duty for an hour already. Perhaps it was time to make that more than a technicality. A quick trip to the Rec Room for his ration cube, and he would take an early recharge.
The mystery of the over-charged minibots could wait for another day.
"Attention Autobot Jazz. Attention Autobot Jazz. This is Teletraan-I. Please respond."
"Oh man, that isn't good."
Jazz's engine skipped a cylinder, his vents stuttering as he picked up the call. His sensors snapped out, the thorough scan for Decepticon activity automatic. Technically he'd left the Nemesis's patrol zone a precise three klicks before Teletraan called, but an Ops mech didn't survive six orns of clandestine infiltration by being careless.
"Jazz here, Teletraan. What's up?"
"Autobot Jazz: return to Ark with maximum velocity." Teletraan-I's comm-voice never lost its flat intonation, but the imperative in his words was unmistakable. "Your presence urgently required."
"Understood."
The saboteur was flying along the dirt road before he completed the acknowledgement. He put the pedal to the metal, his powerful engine giving him all the speed it could and a cloud of dust billowing from his tyre tracks. Already he'd fired off pings to Optimus Prime and to Prowl.
He tried not to worry when neither mech responded. Even for the ever-cool saboteur that effort was doomed to failure.
Returning to the Ark after time away usually meant a spectacular round of parties. There'd be music and high-grade. There was even a chance the stuff might be officially sanctioned, if 'Jack had done as he'd promised and finally got his gadget on line. There'd be reunions too. One of those in particular, he looked forward to above all others. After six orns – almost eighty Earth days – away from the Ark, he'd anticipated Prowl waiting on the perimeter, with his schedule clear and his priorities clearer.
After Teletraan's call, Jazz hardly dared guess what to expect. He slowed before approaching the perimeter, avoiding the main road he'd usually take and dodging Red Alert's sensors. Until he was sure just who was watching them, it seemed kind of smart not to take chances.
Prowl's usual vantage point where the perimeter met the main road was unoccupied. Backed into the shadow of the rock outcrop there, Jazz watched the road for long enough to decide that it wasn't just Prowl breaking his routine. There should have been a patrol along by now, if not two. Instead, the dirt track remained devoid of any sign of activity, until…
A cloud formed on the horizon, silhouetted against the rising Sun. It grew fast, spreading until Jazz's sensitive visor could distinguish two distinct plumes – each rising in the tracks of a dark speck.
The vehicle in the lead was blue, streamlined, and moving fast enough that Jazz could hardly focus on it, let alone consider stepping into its path. The second was different. Jazz knew that chunky shape, and the two-tone grey colour scheme it sported. Quite why the young mech was racing Blurr of all people, the saboteur couldn't imagine, but… Jazz hummed, rocking a little on his pedes.
Frag, if he was ever going to find out why Prowl and the others weren't answering, he had to start somewhere. This was a mech he was more than willing to take a chance on.
"Bluestreak!"
Okay, so maybe stepping out of cover and yelling wasn't the subtlest way of announcing your presence. Jazz still wasn't expecting the young sniper to startle, swerve off the road, drop a tyre into a gulley and roll twice before coming to an unsteady stop.
"Primus, Blue!"
The Ops mech was at Bluestreak's side before the dust settled. Blue transformed with a wince. The young Praxian cycled his optics a few times, a little too fast. He sat, legs splayed out in front of him, servos bracing him against the sun-baked ground. Jazz's inspection was rapid but thorough. Bluestreak's windscreen had a hairline crack – enough to earn him a scolding from Ratchet but hardly a crisis. The saboteur got a servo on the young mech's back, supporting his door hinge and scanning it at the same time. Blue's door-wings were intact, despite their rather alarming twitch, and his helm should have been fine, protected within his alt-frame.
Jazz was just about ready to back up when he looked again and stayed, squatting at the younger mech's side.
He'd known Bluestreak since the kid was a tiny mechling, and helped Prowl drag the infant up in the heart of a civilization-ending war. They'd done their best for their charge, but trauma couldn't be entirely forgotten. Both Jazz and Prowl had learned to worry when the young mech's optics were over-bright and his door-wings mirroring every fleeting thought that passed across his expressive face-plates. Jazz was worried now.
"Blue?" he asked, tone cautious. "You okay there?"
"Jazz?" Blue cycled his optics again, shaking his helm to clear a program loop before actually focussing on the Ops mech. "Jazz!"
It couldn't in all fairness be described as anything but a squeal. Blue threw himself forward, his arms almost throttling the surprised saboteur. "You're home and that's so exciting, and it's been ages, and I'm so glad!"
"Whoa!" Jazz disentangled himself with difficulty, having to use more force than he'd like to put some space between himself and the younger mech. His servo brushed Bluestreak's door-wing and he was surprised to hear a surge from the younger mech's engine, and see the sensory appendage twitch violently at the brief contact. Bluestreak started talking, so fast that not even Jazz could make it more than a word or two from the stream. He shook his helm, raising a hand to gesture for the youngster to back up. "Slow down, Blue! I'm going to mistake you for Blurr if you're not careful!"
"Blurr's faster than I am." Bluestreak frowned, one servo making a sweeping gesture as he imitated the purr of a Cybertronian race engine. "Zooommmm! But I thought it might be kind of fun to have a race and the road seemed to be as good a place as any and no one was really bothering about patrols and I reckoned Prowl might be kinda upset about that, and Prowl's been kind of upset about just about everything lately, so I thought why not?" Bluestreak's door-wings slumped, his expression melancholy. "But Blurr's gone now, and he's left me behind."
Looking up, Jazz noted with some bemusement that the racer was indeed gone. Either Blurr hadn't noticed his companion fall off the road or didn't care. The blue mech was already out of sight, only his dust plume betraying his direction. All things considered, that might be for the best. If Bluestreak was speaking this fast, Blurr would be beyond comprehension.
Standing, pulling the still-clingy Blue with him, Jazz shook his helm.
"What the frag is going on here?" he asked, voice soft with bewilderment.
"Ooohh, you said a naughty word!"
Jazz gave the youngling he'd helped raise a level look. "Bluestreak, you were raised on an army base, amongst some of the foulest-mouthed Autobots I know, and it's been a fragging long time since you were innocent enough for any of them to watch their language around you." Well, Prowl was the exception to that rule but, then, wasn't he always? "You're a grown mech now. Last I checked, grown mechs aren't known for giggling at their sub-commanders."
By rights, his stern tone should have reminded Bluestreak that he was a soldier now, and Jazz was Prime's Lieutenant. Instead, the young warrior leaned against his former guardian's shoulder, cycling his optics sleepily.
"Blue, are you wasted?"
This time it was Blue's turn to gaze back in blank incomprehension. The way his sensor panels wavered, never coming to rest as even the light breeze stimulated them, was another hint. Jazz already had more than enough of those.
"Hammered? Three sheets to the wind? Drunk?" Jazz shook his helm, his servos on his hips as he gazed at the sleepy youngling. "Overcharged?"
That got a response. Bluestreak shook his helm so hard, Jazz had to catch his arm for fear he'd overbalance. "I'd never get overcharged. Prowl would kill me. Well, not kill me, not really, but get really annoyed, you know, and disappointed, and disappointed is much, much worse than annoyed when you think about it, and I'd be in so much trouble." He cycled his optics, his burst of protest fading into bleary-opticed tiredness. "Besides, Prowl was really cross about people getting overcharged, and I heard he told the twins off, and the minibots, and then just about everybody, and last I saw him he was even going on about Wheeljack and that doesn't make sense 'cause everyone knows that Wheeljack is away on a break anyway, after getting the new converter on line, and that means he wasn't on duty, and why shouldn't he have fun if there was… was…what were we talking about?"
Maybe Jazz's grim expression distracted Bluestreak halfway through the explanation. Maybe he'd lost the thread without any help. It hardly mattered. Jazz had heard enough.
It took a few minutes to persuade the youngling he needed to change into his alt-mode, and longer for Bluestreak to remember his own transformation sequence. Jazz ended up folding Blue's door-wings himself, easing the over-sensitised panels into place with the delicacy he'd show with a new spark, and trying to ignore the way the young mech shuddered and twitched in discomfort. It faded fast. Bluestreak dozed off in recharge, the youngling's systems resetting as they dispersed the excess energy, by the time Jazz got a grip with his magnetic towline. Towing a full-sized Datsun was not exactly a cake-walk but Jazz had managed heavier loads. It did mean sticking to the road though. He stayed alert, scanning his surroundings, his internal scowl deepening by the moment.
Blue's account might be hazy but it confirmed that there was a wide-spread issue among the Ark crew. That would be bad for the crew, and worse for their officers. If he hadn't just come back from a quiet Nemesis, Jazz would be worrying about some Decepticon plot underway. As it was, he was pretty slagging sure that Megatron had nothing more immediate on his processor than a hunt for some semi-mythical Mesoamerican treasure or other. The other Decepticons were too busy squabbling amongst themselves to spare much of a thought for the less tempting targets a few hundred mechano-miles away.
That knowledge brought no comfort. If it wasn't the 'Cons, then just what in Primus' name was going on?
The engines of the Ark loomed above Jazz as he approached the defunct ship. Out to his right, a few miles from the main entrance, the dinobots were romping in the dawn light. They seemed to be ignoring him, and frankly Jazz was okay with that. He tucked Bluestreak into the shadow of a somewhat nearer rock outcrop, safely recharging within sight of their home. It wasn't perfect, but it was better than leaving him out on the perimeter. Jazz didn't have time to stand guard, or to go find a substitute minder. Chatting up random Autobots in the hope of learning something new would take more time than he was prepared to spare. He needed to get inside and figure this out properly before he got mired in any more unintelligible conversations.
"Jazz!"
"Wha…? Hey!"
Okay, so it was good to see the boss-bot intact and functioning. Jazz could have used a little warning, though, before the big mech stepped out of the gloom below the engines and hauled him into the biggest, tightest embrace he could remember.
For a few seconds, as his vents seized and spluttered for lack of fresh air, Jazz wondered if this was what it felt like to be a human. Okay, Optimus Prime wasn't that much bigger than Jazz, but when all the strength in his powerful frame was manifest as sheer exuberance, he sure seemed to be.
Suppressing his strained vents, Jazz twisted and pulsed his magnets at the same time. He slipped from Prime's bear hug and landed on his pedes, gasping a little to even out the interrupted cooling cycle. Usually he wouldn't bother, but he was still hot from his full-speed drive home, and you never knew when being sensor-cool would come in handy. If you had to dodge your beaming commander, for instance.
"Hey, Prime. Thought it was about time to come on back to the barn."
"It is good to see you." A duck and a quick step backwards avoided a renewed hug. "Prowl will be happy." Optimus rocked a little backwards and forwards, his bright optics slipping past Jazz to the morning sunshine beyond. "He has been rather cross of late."
That wasn't a good thought. Jazz pushed it aside out of sheer necessity, faced with the bigger problem right in front of him. Prime carried it off well, Jazz had to admit that. Over effusive greetings aside, he might be making idle conversation. His blast mask had to help with that, hiding the inane grin Jazz was pretty sure must lurk behind it. Without door-wings, his charge-driven fidgeting wasn't as obvious as Blue's, but Prime's servos clenched and unclenched, his engine rumbling as he stood there.
"Wow, boss." Jazz shook his helm, speaking softly. "Isn't it a bit early in the orn to be that sloshed?"
Prime's optics cycled at him, the focussing gesture depressingly familiar. "Jazz! I wouldn't…" Static washed out Optimus's voice, and he was forced to wait for a few klicks for it to clear before trying again. "I wouldn't exceed my allocated ration. It would set an un… unacceptable example to the…"
Jazz almost laughed as the static returned. Optimus Prime was trying to protest his sobriety even as his frame indulged in hiccups.
"Did Prowler tell you that? Where is he, anyway?"
Prime shrugged. "Not seen him today." A burst of static and Prime frowned, confusion showing in his optics. "Or yesterday, I think. I'm not sure. Things are kind of… weird."
"You're telling me." Weird and worrying. Jazz stepped back, servos on his hips and helm cocked as he looked up at the big mech in front of him. Prime held his high-grade better than Bluestreak did, but some things were inevitable. And unlike the youngling, Jazz wasn't about to tow his commander home – not without some pretty substantial help. Even if Prime didn't drift into recharge on some back road, Jazz wasn't over-enamoured of the idea of leaving him exposed. The Decepticons had distractions of their own, but you never knew when one of their patrols would get lucky. "Look, Prime, come with me a minute. Okay?"
Optimus's faceplates were never more than half-visible. There was no mistaking the pout, nonetheless. Prime looked past Jazz at the bright morning Sun and the refreshing mist it was raising from the rocky landscape. Even Jazz had to admit a drive looked tempting. Not today though.
"Prime, it's important." Jazz spoke firmly, his arms crossing in front of him. "I've got to speak to you, right? Just come with me, boss."
Vorns of learning to talk to his commander – and to the sadly overcharged – paid off. It took a bit of manoeuvring, with Jazz ducking under his commander's arm and nudging to steer his meandering path, but eventually they were moving.
Jazz had only been a few metres from the Ark's entrance hatch when Prime intercepted him. It was easy enough to get his friend back aboard. Navigating the vast rock pillars and uneven floor of the control room was trickier. Jazz swore inwardly, unsurprised but disappointed when he propped Optimus against a familiar door frame, only to find Prowl's office beyond empty. He backed out, placating his confused Prime. After that, deciding to make the turn for the Rec Room rather than medbay was just a matter of following the caterwaul that passed for some mad-mech's misconceived attempt at singing.
There were many things about a roaring drunk Ironhide and equally sozzled Ratchet that offended Jazz's fine-honed senses. Their merciless torturing of an innocent melody was merely the most egregious.
The two were sprawled across the Rec Room sofa. Ironhide's red armour and Ratchet's white were shoulder to shoulder. Ironhide had draped his arm around Ratchet's back with all the affection of high-grade lubricated brothers-at-arms. Ratch was raising a cube to his comrade in an incoherent toast when Jazz and Prime arrived. If the medic's optics hadn't already been startlingly bright, they'd have brightened. He grinned, the expression not exactly unknown on Ratchet's faceplates, but certainly unusual.
"Op… Optimus! And Jazz! You're home!"
Jazz's lopsided grin was entirely false. Sure, it was good to see his friends having a good time, but this had gone beyond funny some time before. He shuffled forward, manoeuvring Prime until he could drop the mech into a comfortable arm chair. Optimus didn't resist, his expression bemused and amused at the same time.
"Yup. Just delivering the big guy."
Ratchet frowned at him. "You look kinda… kinda tired, Jazz. Come sit down. Have a cube."
"Later, maybe, okay? Got stuff to do."
"Jazz, stay." Optimus Prime might be processing slow, but, Primus, the mech had a strong grip. Jazz should probably have anticipated the servo that snaked out to grab his wrist. He shook his helm, trying to extract his servo without breaking optic contact with his boss. "You're my best friend," Optimus confided softly.
That got a reaction from the pair on the sofa. Ratchet frowned. Ironhide's open faceplates took on the desolate incomprehension of a kicked puppy.
"Awww, Prime!" Ironhide's accent had thickened almost to the point where he was scarcely understandable. The hurt was obvious, even if the words were blurred. "Thought I was your best friend."
Prime straightened, his expression betraying shock at the desolate tone.
"You are! You're my best friend, 'Hide. And, Ratchet, you are too! And Jazz. And… and… Prowl! Prowler's my best friend too."
Ironhide snorted and settled back down, apparently satisfied by this assertion. He looked around him, his optics bleary and unfocussed. "Where is Prowl anyway?"
"That's what I'd kind of like to know."
Jazz had taken a step back, free now of Prime's grip and reluctant to risk affectionate recapture. He spoke quietly and his serious tone didn't seem to register with his friends. Either way, they didn't seem to have an answer for him. Shaking his helm, Jazz crossed the room. The Ark's single functional energon dispenser was surrounded by a litter of empty cubes, their shells not recycled as regulations required.
A good whiff of the dregs confirmed Jazz's suspicions. Shaking his helm, he grabbed a clean cube and splashed just fresh energon from the dispenser into the bottom. Isolating his fuel processing system, he took a careful sip.
The sting of high-grade hit his mouth sensors with its familiar wallop. Ops algorithms engaged and processed, analysing the fluid for threats, ready to shunt it aside into a holding tank if it were in any way suspect. He gave the command to do just that, humming thoughtfully.
The first thing he felt was sheer relief. His poison analysis reported clear without a moment's hesitation. Yes, it was high grade, but it could have been so much worse. Whatever the frag had got his friends in this state, it eased the tension in his spark to know they'd recover with little more than a thundering processor ache.
His second thought was confusion. There was high grade and then there was high grade. This wasn't strong, not even by Prowl's standards. The base solvent was carrying just under two hundred percent of the usual energy concentration if his analysis systems were any judge. The base itself was the same carbon-rich liquid they'd all become accustomed to since landing on Earth, but there was an extra tang – a hint of iron, and… was that sulphur?
The new flavour was an anomaly Jazz noted for later consideration. What really puzzled him though was that concentration reading. Two hundred percent was not exactly what their human friends would call hard liquor. He'd seen Ironhide enjoy four, five hundreds, albeit in small portions. Two shouldn't be giving the Ark's crew much more than a pleasant buzz.
Stepping away from the device, Jazz shot the cubes around it a grim look and reconsidered. Knocking back the hard stuff with a few standard grades on hand to flush the excess was one thing. Drinking full-sized cubes of high grade, even at two hundred, when it was your only energon source was quite another. Given the state of the Ark, the crew had almost certainly been doing the latter for quite some time.
Even a mech accustomed to occasional indulgence would find an exclusive diet of high grade hard on the systems.
Ratchet had dozed off, his helm resting on Ironhide's shoulder. Hide was singing again, if you had a loose grasp of the definition of the word. Jazz's audials tried to shut down as Optimus Prime lifted his voice in a misguided attempt to lead the way. He gritted his teeth and forced his audial systems to stay online, not able to afford the loss of sensory input. He had a fair idea now what had happened. He had no fragging idea how his fellow officers had come to allow it.
No one noticed when Jazz slipped away. That was fine by him.
The Ark wasn't exactly quiet.
Jazz could hear conversation, arguments and the occasional song coming from various private quarters. With his sensor suite on full alert, he could feel the rumble of other mechs moving around, somewhere out of sight. He moved cautiously, careful to keep them that way.
He wasn't looking for more stray meetings and over-effusive greetings.
The quarters he shared with Prowl were dark and deserted. He hesitated in the doorway, his instincts screaming at him to hunt the mech down before anything else. Duty won his internal battle. Snarling an oath, Jazz spun on his heel, speeding up a little as he put distance between himself and the empty quarters. The sooner he got this mess sorted out the better.
The room he headed for was two corridors over and a few doors sternwards. There was nothing to distinguish it from those to either side, nothing except the glare Jazz directed it. By rights the metal should have melted and run out of his path. He paused, taking a few klicks to cool his vents. He didn't have anything more than suspicion, and some part of his processor was telling him not to believe that. Still, according to Blue's ramble, Prowl had shared his doubts and that was reason enough to pursue them.
His first thumps against the door got him no response. His second followed fast, an unaccustomed impatience driving him. He shook his helm, concentrating on his sensor input for long enough to be sure of himself, before snapping out with a narrow private comm signal.
"Sunstreaker, Sideswipe, I know you're in there. If you don't open this fragging door this instant, I will burn it down."
Now that got a reaction. The two spark signatures inside burst into movement. Sideswipe deactivated the locking mechanism and yanked the door open so quickly he virtually fell through it.
"Jazz! You're back!"
"About slagging time!" The first of those comments came from Sideswipe. The second was delivered in Sunstreaker's unique style but betrayed equal relief.
Jazz strode into their room, the twins giving ground in front of him. He wasn't exactly the most frequent visitor to their quarters, but he'd been in the room often enough to spot the all too obvious new addition. The twins might be friends, but he was still their officer. The hissing, bubbling device in the corner had never been on quite such blatant display. As Jazz watched, a single drop formed on the output pipe, trembling there for several long clicks before joining the shallow pool in the flask below. He looked at it, visor polarised, expression grim.
"You have a still," he noted, his voice abnormally calm.
Sideswipe cycled his optics, snorting air out through his vents. "Like you didn't know that. Pit, even Prowl knows that. Not like you can accuse us of anything now anyway. Do you have any slagging idea how wrong it feels taking the kick out of energon?"
Jazz raised a brow-ridge, holding his peace for a few moments more as Sunstreaker folded his arms. The yellow twin was polished almost to mirror-brightness. That, as much as Sideswipe's openness, told Jazz how worried the two mechs were.
"You're taking the kick out? You're sure that's all?"
Scanning them confirmed the Ops mech's guess – both were overcharged, but to nowhere near the same extent as the others he'd encountered. If it was the still in the corner letting them manage that, it was kind of hard to fault them for it. If that's all it was doing…
Sunstreaker growled. "Has hanging out with the 'Cons melted your processor, Jazz? You think that thing's big enough to get the whole Ark 'charged?"
Sideswipe mirrored his twin's stance, arms folded, but with a flicker of amusement for the scenario. "Slag that. We had that kind of tech, we'd have gone commercial vorns ago!"
Jazz's nebulous doubt coalesced. This was the point that had bothered him since the twins first swam to the top of his list of prime suspects. It wasn't so much the irresponsibility of it – the twins' pranks had been known to misfire with spectacular consequences before – but the simple practicality. The officer corps had known about, and quietly tolerated, Sideswipe and Sunstreaker's brewing experiments for most of the length of the war. The twins had never come anywhere close to producing the volumes needed for this debacle.
Venting a sigh, Jazz let himself drop onto the edge of Sideswipe's berth. He was tired enough that his struts were aching. He was worried and more than a little fed up. Maybe a sober conversation was out of reach for the moment, but he'd take the nearest he could find.
"What the frag happened?"
Sunstreaker shrugged and dropped onto his own berth. "Slagged if we know."
Sideswipe was only marginally more communicative. The red front-liner paced his quarters, glaring at nothing.
"Started a few orns back. At first it was kind of funny, you know? Well, except for the being cruelly and unjustly accused."
Jazz raised a cynical brow-ridge, letting his visor drift towards the bubbling distillery in the corner.
"Of running an illegal still?"
Sideswipe shot him a grin, indignation forgotten.
"Of wasting the product on lightweight minibots." Sideswipe's grin faded. "Then it started getting serious. It wasn't just the minibots getting overcharged. Not all at once, but quick enough no one much knew what to do. Most of us were too far gone by that point to care." Sideswipe and Sunstreaker exchanged a look, evidently including themselves in that group. "Took us half an orn just to work out how out of it we were," Sideswipe went on. "Prowl not showing up for duty was pretty much the last clue. I mean, Prowl going AWOL?" He nodded over at the still. "That's when we decided to take steps, but we're not really set up to go this way round. It's kinda slow going. It's been all we can do to get halfway sober ourselves."
Sunstreaker put down the polishing cloth he'd been twisting, his sharp blue optics pinning Jazz where he sat. "We were talking about trying to sober Bee and Blue up when you got here. That or coming after you instead."
Jazz shot them a grin. The twins were just about the only mechs on the Ark who'd seriously consider making an open run against the Nemesis itself – even if they weren't half-drunk at the time. It was something of a relief that his return had beaten them to the attempt.
"So…" he said, keeping his tone light, even as he watched both from behind his visor. "Now you've got the fragging insane plan out of the way, got any smarter ideas about all this?"
"Not a pit-slagged clue."
Well, so much for that hope. Jazz pushed nonetheless. They'd been here. They had to have seen something. "No accidents? Nothing out of the normal?"
Sideswipe dropped onto the berth beside him and tucked his servos under his helm, frustration written across his sprawled frame.
"About the most interesting thing going on was Wheeljack getting stick for the lousy flavour of his new stuff. But that was orns ago. People were just about getting used to it when all this blew up. And not in a Wheeljack-y way, either."
"Some people," Sunstreaker corrected, a scowl twisting his elegant faceplates. "Haven't had a mouthful of decent fuel since that geo-thingamy came online."
"'Jack's geothermal energy converter?" His second suspect, after the twins, and about as unlikely. He'd wondered about it when he picked up the sulphur tang earlier.
Jazz had a reputation for not listening in staff meetings. As those who mattered knew well, he never let his attention lapse until he was sure a matter was in hand. In the case of Wheeljack's energon system upgrade, he'd seen the plans, watched Prowl and Ratchet scowl over them, and kicked back his heels, never doubting the system would be vetted to within an inch of its life. He shook his helm, letting a hint of a frown show. "It was due online five orns ago, right? No way Prowler and Ratch let the thing anywhere near a dispenser without tests."
Sideswipe shrugged, helm tilted so he could see Jazz. "Days of them. Ratch said it was safe, and Prowl agreed. Doesn't mean it had to taste good."
"Can't say I'm getting a good vibe, but if Prowl and Ratch ticked this thing's boxes, it's kinda tough to argue."
Jazz pushed up from the berth, heading for the door. A basic sustenance device tested and certified weeks before the problems started wasn't the kind of lead he'd hoped for. If he wasn't so short of other ideas, he might dismiss it entirely. As it was, he added it to his list of things to check out. There was another, more urgent, task on that list, and Jazz's concern was rapidly overriding his sense of duty.
"Right. I'm sending the two of you the coordinates where I left Bluestreak." He waited for both to nod, acknowledging the transmission. "Do me a favour and haul him in. Bumblebee too if you can find the kid." Jazz winced in anticipation. The Ark's two youngest crew could have no idea what kind of charge hangover lurked in their future. They'd soon learn. He tapped his visor in farewell, heading out through the door. "I'll be back."
"Autobot Jazz – greetings."
His first time through the control room, with Optimus Prime weighing down one of his shoulders, there'd not been time to stop for a chat. Now he dropped into the chair in front of Teletraan-I's console and would swear he heard a note of relief in the AI's voice.
"Man, you weren't kidding about needing me, were you?"
"Ark activities unacceptably impaired. Command presence required."
"Yeah, I kind of got that." Jazz leaned back in the seat, propping his pedes on the console as he stretched out. "What's SkySpy got on the Decepticons?"
"Activity from Nemesis currently within normal parameters. Decepticon patrols following established patterns."
"Well, that's one bright spark in this smelting pit." Jazz shook his helm, letting a rare scowl show. "Let me know if anything changes, right?"
"Alert request acknowledged. Will comply."
"Right." Jazz pushed himself up, his visor focussing on the screen in front of him. "Now: where's Prowl?"
"Autobot Prowl is not aboard the Ark."
The mech hadn't been in his office or in their quarters. Even so, Jazz wasn't expecting Teletraan's flat reply. "What? Then where…?"
"Location… unknown."
"Frag." Jazz's servo came up, massaging his temples where visor met helm.
"Hypothesis available."
Jazz's optics cycled behind their protective visor. He squinted up at the screen.
"Hit me."
"Prowl may be accompanied by Autobot Beachcomber."
"'Comber?" For the second time in as many minutes, Jazz's optics blinked. He was sitting straight in the chair now, rather than in the slouch he employed primarily to tease Prowl. "But Beachcomber's been in stasis since the crash!"
"Information obsolete." Well, that was kind of overstating it, but Jazz got the point. Teletraan went on with his painfully slow delivery. "Accumulated energy reserves as of oh-point-eight-one orns ago sufficient to revive one additional mech."
"And Prowl decided the mech we really needed, stranded on a primitive planet with the Decepticon high command, was a friendly, pacifist geologist."
"Affirmative."
Jazz managed a wan grin. "Thanks, man, but that wasn't a question." His servos drummed a tattoo on the interface's counter. Prowl might have been the worse for energon, but it was hard to see a train of thought that would lead the tactician to such an eclectic choice. "What was the last information Prowl requested before reviving 'Comber?"
"Request: remaining time before scheduled mission completion. Subject: Autobot Jazz."
This time, the flicker of a smile on Jazz's face was a good deal more genuine.
"And before that?"
"Request: energon reserve projection – potential for stasis revival."
Jazz waved a hand, cranking an invisible handle. Sometimes getting information out of Teletraan felt like mining the last speck of cybertronium from an exhausted vein: a whole lot of hard work with very little to show for it. "Keep going, buddy."
"Request: records of volcanic and seismic activity sensor readings in an elapsed fifty orn period."
"Show me."
He saw it at once, as Prowl must have done. The axes on the graph could have been labelled in Old Kaonite for all the sense they made to Jazz, but the line told its own story. Whatever it was Teletraan was measuring, its long-term trend was pretty stable. In the shorter term the variation was far more severe. The first portion of the graph was empty, predating their awakening on Earth. The data itself started with a sharp down-kick, interrupted by occasional blips, and given what Prowl had asked for, Jazz was willing to guess that was the eruption that woke them and its aftershocks. After that it levelled out, only occasionally taking a detour, either above or below the trendline. Most of the last six months looked pretty flat, no deviations more than a few percent of whatever was being measured. The last four orns though…
Jazz stood, tracing the rising line with his servos. The track got steeper as it went along. That was about as much as he could tell. Whatever it was, he was willing to bet it wasn't good.
"Okay, Teletraan old buddy, listen up – this one is kind of complicated. Prowl showed Beachcomber this graph, right? So when he did, and after 'Comber had asked what it was and where we were and all that stuff, what info did he ask for?"
It took Teletraan-I a klick or two to parse the question, the lighted patterns on his displays flickering with his processing algorithms. Then the screen lit up, the artificial intelligence opting to jump straight to the inevitable request for the data itself rather than merely reporting the query.
Jazz studied the map of Mount St Hillary, watching as Teletraan zoomed in, first to the Ark, then to cinder cone that towered above the craft, highlighting the natural tunnels and cave openings that riddled it, and finally to a particular cavern, sited a bare few mechanometers above a magma conduit. A blueprint popped up – one Jazz had seen before.
"All right." The saboteur pushed up from the seat. His visor was bright, his frame tensed in anticipation. "Now we're cooking on gas."
Cooking was the right word. The caves that ran under the Ark, and up through the volcano towering above it, were never really Jazz's scene. Given the choice, the Ops mech preferred somewhere with a little more life and colour. He was used to thinking of the mountain and its caves as cold, dark and empty, on the rare occasions he thought about them at all. Nothing he'd seen since locating the entrance to this particular tunnel, just below the summit, dissuaded him from the last two of those. The first though… well, that might use some revision.
The heart of the volcano, the magma chamber itself, was well below the Ark and still all but empty after the enormous eruption that reawakened them. The conduit Wheeljack had found was a side spur high on the mountainside, feeding through a fault between rock strata. The original lava tube that led to it was half-collapsed, its ceiling propped up in places. It ran perhaps half a mile inwards from the surface, its twists, turns and occasional forks rapidly obscuring the sunlight Jazz had left behind. Without the map Teletraan had provided, he'd have turned back long ago. As it was, until the tunnel broadened into a larger space, he was less than confident about the directions he'd been given.
From what 'Jack had said, the cave he'd chosen as a location his geothermal energy converter had been pleasantly warm; 'kinda like bathing in a heated oil bath'. Maybe it had been like that, when the device was installed, checked and activated. Now it was something else again.
Jazz moved in a series of lithe jumps from rock to rock. Some were standing pillars, the union of stalactite and stalagmite. Others were fallen rubble, shattered by the force of the recent eruption. The thick limestone encrustations provided at least a little insulation. He needed it. Heat rose in hazy waves from the floor and through the air around him. The rock floor itself glowed a dull red instead of its usual dusty orange-grey. It was nowhere near smelting heat; that was some comfort. If he happened to fall, Jazz's pedes would probably take a brief contact with no more than moderate pain, but he couldn't say he felt much like testing the idea. It was uncomfortable enough operating with stifled vents, dumping heat from his processor into his own frame to help it dissipate. He couldn't keep it up for long. He hoped he wouldn't have to.
The machine swam out of the heat-haze, its silhouette lacking clarity in the shimmering air. Wheeljack had added his usual dash of showmanship: dials and switches a little larger than a mech really needed; colour scheme bordering on offensive to Jazz's sensitive visor. Other than that, it looked a whole lot like the plans Jazz had seen. It squatted on the rock floor, a truncated pyramid with controls on the upper surface and a whole lot of weight underneath. A hum rose from it, adding to the vibrations in the air, and conveying a sense of urgency and activity beyond Jazz's comprehension.
Pausing a few mechanometers away, the Ops mech studied it warily. Usually he'd think twice, if not three or four times, before approaching a Wheeljack creation making as much noise as this one. A hum like that usually meant high power transfer rate. Surging power in one of 'Jack's toys was rarely a good thing.
"Jazz!" The call saved him from having to decide whether or not to take the risk. The voice behind it was mellow, warm and pleased. It was one he hadn't heard for a very long time… over four million years in fact.
He grinned. The Autobots' geologist was an impossible mech to dislike.
"Good to see you, 'Comber."
Beachcomber appeared from behind a stalagmite, ambling along as if taking a stroll along a cool beach. Jazz eyed the other mech's solid pedes, insulated to take all the vagaries of an organic planet, with just a hint of jealousy before raising his visor to take in the rest of him.
Beachcomber's colour scheme hadn't changed. He still wore the same vibrant blue that Jazz used for his own highlight. His visor was almost golden, reflecting the heat of the floor but making the dull glow vibrant with the warmth of his personality. A few things were different. Prominent tyres at his shoulders and knees made it clear that Teletraan-1 had chosen an Earth alt-mode as part of the revival process. On the whole though, his silhouette was still that of the mech Jazz had known on Cybertron – a pacifist at spark, as so many other Autobots had once been, but with the strength and courage to join the fight without compromising those views.
"Oh, Jazz. You're back." Beachcomber's smile was as genuine as any Jazz had seen. The geologist looked around him, shrugging his shoulders to settle the still-new tyres and turning warm optics back on the saboteur. "Isn't this wonderful? I've not seen a world like this one since before the Academy was destroyed. There are so many different formations. We must be above a very active subduction zone. Do you know if this planet has many micro-plates or just a few super-continents? The variety of mineral compounds I am scanning is really quite remarkable. It suggests a complex water and gas cycle."
"Whoa!" Jazz held us his servos in surrender, laughter in his vocalisor despite the situation. "Way outside my zone, man. I just live here and want to know it won't go bang again. You'd better ask 'Jack, or Hound, or go talk to the humans about that stuff."
"The indigenous sentients?" Beachcomber nodded, glancing upwards and clenching his servos as if eager to reach out through the rocks. "Yes, Prowl mentioned them. I can't wait to meet them."
Jazz tried not to be too obvious as he looked past Beachcomber, peering into the heat haze. He kept his voice carefully casual. "So, where is Prowler, anyway?"
The smile on 'Comber's faceplates faltered a little. A small frown appeared as Beachcomber shook his helm.
"I'm not sure. I completed the assessment he requested, but when I turned around to report, he'd gone. I was just looking for him." Beachcomber had reached Jazz's vantage point now, and passed the Ops mech, strolling towards the machine. "We really ought to do something about this, but I wanted to check with an officer before taking action."
Leaning back against the rock pillar he was perched on, Jazz spread his servos in front of him.
"I'm all yours, mech."
"Oh! Yes, of course." Beachcomber shook his helm again, switching mental tracks. If Prowl wasn't available, then no one was placed much better than Jazz to review his data. No one else was here, in any case. "Wheeljack's device appears to have acted as a trigger for a capillary process. It's drawing heat, and magma, upwards and the rising magma appears to have forced a dyke into the surrounding rock strata, widening existing faults in the process."
Usually Jazz would let his visor glaze over around about now. That wasn't an option. Beachcomber's spiel had gone over his helm, but not quite out of arm's reach. Jazz was an intelligent mech – one who lived on the side of a volcano and had sat through a dozen officer's meetings where it was discussed at length. He'd got the gist.
"So 'Jack and the others didn't notice the mountain bursting open because…?"
"Bursing open?" Beachcomber laughed. "I can tell you're an Ops mech, Jazz. Not so fast! You've got to ease up and slow down a bit. This was kind of fast by my standards but not Unicron-on-your-tailpipe fast. This was a gradual process. We're talking orns here."
Jazz groaned, one servo coming up and his helm dropping forwards to bury his faceplates in it. 'Comber was right. His processor worked in leaps and bursts, tuned for the contingencies of Special Operations work. That meant he was good at taking the pieces and putting them together. Looking up, he shook his helm.
"Let's see if I've got this. Day one, the thing works fine. No fireworks, and that's a good start, but it's going pretty smoothly all in all. Orn one, even. Still good. Took orns to heat up, right?"
Beachcomber cycled his optics, confused by the repetition. "Yes, Jazz."
"And the whole time, the energon kicking out of this thing is…?"
"Oh!" 'Comber took a step back, looking back at the converter as if seeing it for the first time. "Well, the converter was set to process a fixed percentage of the available heat transferred per unit time and it appears to be working perfectly. As it heated up, the energon would be… getting gradually stronger, I suppose."
Guess confirmed. Jazz sighed, regretting it as his vents refilled with superheated air.
"They got overcharged so slowly they were already out of their processors before anyone noticed." Jazz paused, glaring at the machine. He drummed his servos against the rock pillar he held, shifting in the vain hope of finding a cooler air current. Beachcomber shook his helm, as confused by the vagaries of his fellow Autobots as by this bewildering new world. He waited for the saboteur to go on, his expression becoming increasingly nervous as the pause stretched out.
"Ah, Jazz?"
"Wheeljack built the converter, right?" Jazz didn't look away from the device. He spoke in a level, almost resigned, tone. "So, I've gotta wonder – when's the boom coming?"
Beachcomber's grimace was all the answer he needed. The geologist looked hesitant, almost apologetic. "In about another half orn?" he offered.
"Let me guess… that rising line on the curve Teletraan plotted?"
"The pressure's building, and the energon converter is acting as a catalyst for the magma flow."
"Guessing we don't want to be standing next to this thing when it goes, right?"
Beachcomber gave him an embarrassed look. "Um… I was wondering… is the Ark still flightworthy?"
The long pause stretched out. Jazz shook his helm, his sense of the ridiculous kicking in, almost in self-defence.
"So, 'Comber. Just you and me, and you've got my say so. So what do we do?"
"Oh!" Beachcomber cycled his optics at Jazz, visibly reminding himself that the approachable Ops mech was in fact his commanding officer. Nodding, he reached out, his heat-proofed servos indifferent to the red-hot glow of the converter. With a tentative air, he flicked a switch.
A light on the machine's top surface flickered and went out. The hum faltered, stuttered and then faded.
Jazz's vents hiccupped. He cycled his optics, rubbing his helm in disbelief. "That's it?"
Beachcomber chuckled.
"Yes." A sudden frown crossed his faceplates as he reconsidered. "Well… no. We should probably open a side vent pretty fast to channel the pressure away, and I'm rather hoping there are still other energon condensers elsewhere. Wheeljack had probably better come and see what he can do with this one when he's able, too, but basically… yes."
Another feature of being an Ops mech: rapid adjustments.
"Right." Jazz nodded. He adjusted his visor, his processor already going through the resources available and just how much energon the old solar array would need to come up with to dilute the geothermal stuff to something even halfway drinkable. There would be a Pit-load of bad helms on the Ark for the next few orns, but he'd seen the aftermath of the twins' parties… and his own. They'd cope. "Right," he repeated. "Crisis averted. Look, 'Comber – why don't you head to the surface and back on down to the Ark? Get Teletraan to point you to Sunny and Sides' cabin. Tell the Twins I sent you, and to get folks moving on what you need. See if you guys can sober Ratchet up – raid the emergency energon supply in medbay, if you have to. Make sure someone's on monitors too, even if you have to get Sunstreaker to twist an arm or two."
Beachcomber tilted his helm, open surprise on his face-plates. Jazz didn't wait for the mech to acknowledge the rapid stream of orders. He was already making his way back along the narrowing tunnel, his processor running ahead of him. He glanced back to see the geologist starting to move and nodded in satisfaction.
"Jazz!" Beachcomber called after him. "You're not coming?"
Jazz grimaced, shaking his helm. "I've got another problem to track down first." He glanced back, determination brightening his visor. "Get going. I'll be back when I can."
It took two hours.
Two long hours of wandering through a network of lava tunnels so complex Jazz wondered that the entire volcano didn't collapse in on itself. From time to time he found himself back on the surface, grey ash and orange dirt crunching under his pedes. Each time, he cycled his visor, blinking in the sunlight, and scanned his surroundings before searching onwards.
He was starting to wonder if he was looking in the right place, starting to despair of ever finding what he was searching for, when he saw the pede-print. It wasn't his careful search that yielded results, but rather a frustrated glance out through the entrance of the hundredth passageway he'd stumbled across. He'd never have seen it if he was any closer to it. From a dozen metres away, with the sun sinking toward the horizon and his visor casting a low beam of illumination, the angle was just right. The contours in the patch of gritty dirt, compressed in some places and mounded in others by deep treads, couldn't have been more than a few millimetres high. From this angle they cast long shadows, catching Jazz's sensitive visor.
That was the first clue. There were others now he was on the trail, a scuff here, a mark there. Jazz noted them and pushed onwards, his pedes moving faster and faster as he approached his goal.
The sun was well past zenith, almost at the end of a long day. Here, in the shadow of the mountain itself, it might as well already be twilight. Jazz half fell into another tunnel opening, his lithe frame twisting to land him on his pedes. Shaking his help, he vented hard and set off along yet another tunnel. The dull gleam that told Jazz he was headed towards a surface opening was a welcome sight. He sped up, eager for a gasp of fresh air in his vents and a glimpse of the fading daylight before following the trail onwards.
Then he saw the huddled shape, curled in an alcove on the line between light and darkness, and he stopped as if struck by Wheeljack's ill-fated immobiliser.
Jazz's vents rushed out in a long gust of air.
Even after the frustrations of the day and the long orns of surveillance that went before, this couldn't be rushed. Jazz took the time to calm his vents and ease his systems into a stealth mode he rarely used except on missions. He polarised his visor, and pulled his active sensors in, relying entirely on passive inputs. When he moved, he moved silently, drifting forward like a phantasm or wandering spark-ghost.
The mech in the alcove twitched, curling a little tighter, his arms wrapped tightly around his knees, his helm buried against them.
For all Jazz's efforts, his presence was noticed and the stimulation couldn't help but cause pain. A tactical processor and door-wings tuned to the peak of Praxian potential were not designed to interact with high-grade. At best, they'd be oversensitive, distracting and uncomfortable. At worst, the noise, vibration and sheer torrent of sensory data would be overwhelming.
Optimus Prime got playful when he was overcharged. Ironhide wound up jolly and affectionate, with an unfortunate tendency to 'sing'. Ratchet could be expansive on a good day, sour and confrontational on a bad one. Jazz himself enjoyed the buzz of a good cube in his systems, the energy it gave him and the excuse to cast even his few social inhibitions to the winds.
Prowl, on the other hand, avoided high-grade entirely. On the rare occasions he could be persuaded to sip a small amount – for celebration or remembrance – he quickly grew maudlin, tired and angry. The memory filters that kept him functional and sane after all he'd seen in this Primus-forsaken war were woven as intricately through his tactical processor as his core systems. Anything that impeded them would bring depression within klicks, and high-grade couldn't be anything with an impediment. That was just one of the risks the mech faced overcharging. The sensory overload that came from his hyper-tuned door-wings after even a half-tank of high-grade was about as much of a strain as Prowl's systems could take.
There was more than one reason Jazz had been anxious to find the tactician since he first realised what was happening. Small wonder the mech hadn't been able to stick it out with Beachcomber. Jazz was hardly surprised his companion had sought out the quietest, most empty place he could find to wait out the effects, or that he'd stalled here, unable to face the daylight beyond the tunnel entrance. It was a miracle Prowl had kept functioning as long as he had.
Crouching, Jazz hummed, just a quiet note from the back of his vocalisor. The mech in front of him flinched, not relaxing from that tight crouch.
Touching the black and white plating was a risk. A light touch would be worse than nothing, teasing Prowl's over-sensitive plating rather than soothing it. Carefully, avoiding those twitching, sensor-rich door-wings as if they were booby traps in the ducts of the Nemesis, Jazz placed his servo flat on the small of his partner's back, pressing firmly just below the door-hinge. The mech shuddered, but the touch grounded him, forcing him to face the world outside of his huddled frame.
Prowl's helm shook and then rose, just a little, just enough for startlingly bright optics to illuminate the cave around them. Jazz had never seen optic sensors so brilliant or so unfocused. He'd never seen an expression on his companion's face at once so desperate and full of hope.
"Jazz!" All the times his name had been cried out since he left the Nemesis, in so many ways, and in the voices of so many of his friends – none of them meant a fraction of that low, static-riddled whisper.
"It's me." Shaking his helm, relief warring with concern, Jazz vented a sigh. He spoke in his lowest tones, barely audible in normal circumstances. "I'm here. I've got you."
The jolt from his palm-magnets was carefully timed, carefully placed and as delicate as he could manage.
"Sleep well, Prowler," he whispered, as the mech's systems cycled down to stasis beside him.
Grimlock was tap-dancing on his helm.
That was the first conclusion Prowl reached on rousing from stasis. It was the only logical explanation for the thundering roar that filled every one of his senses.
He shifted, uncomfortable on the hard berth beneath him, and then froze. His door-wings were sluggish and unresponsive. He could still feel them – no medic would allow a Praxian to wake in any other condition – but he could also feel the medical codes attenuating their feedback and leaving them numbed.
Even without processing that distraction, it took Prowl a while to sort out his other rebooting senses. Sound came first, competing with the roar from his abused processor.
"Jazz, will you slagging well sit still! I'm tired of you getting in the way."
Ratchet's growl wasn't the most welcoming of greetings. Still flat on the berth, Prowl's audials strained, listening eagerly for the response.
"Sure thing, Ratch." Jazz sounded tired, but cheerful. There was a thud – the saboteur dropping onto a berth with more than necessary force.
"Don't you have things to do?" Ratchet again, still annoyed.
"Nothing more important than this," Jazz said quietly. Those few words weren't much, but Prowl felt himself relax nonetheless. He'd missed the infuriating mech more than most would believe. "Besides, I'd rather be under your pedes than Ironhide's right now. Wow, is that mech a grouch when he's hung-over!"
Ratchet's engine grumbled, apparently sharing the sentiment. "Just tell me you got the solar arrays back online?"
"Yup." The serious tone in Jazz's voice would surprise most of the crew. This was the Ops mech in officer mode, dealing with necessity rather than his usual volatile whim. "Got Sides to check the grade too, just to be safe. We're gonna be on short rations for a while, but we're getting there." The mech paused. "Sunny's on top of the vent thing too. Looks like we're not going to explode after all." Jazz's vocalisor took on a wry edge. "Yippee-ai-ee."
Prowl's audial systems reported their reboot complete. His optics lit, dimly at first, but gradually focussing on the medic standing beside his berth. Ratchet vented a sigh, still looking at Jazz.
"You do realise the Twins are going to be insufferable for orns?"
"They kind of earned it this time." Jazz shrugged, the movement drawing Prowl's optics towards him. For a few seconds, still in reboot haze, the tactician just let his optics rest on the lithe mech and the broad blue racing stripe that ran down to his bumper. It had been too long, far too long, since he'd seen his companion.
Covert study of Jazz was rarely possible. Prowl would swear the mech had extra sensors, able to feel the touch of another mech's optics. The saboteur straightened, his visor shifting from Ratchet to the berth beside him. A slow smile spread across the mech's pale faceplates, morphing into a familiar lop-sided smirk. The serious tone dropped from his vocalisor, replaced by a warmth he reserved for a precious few mechs, Prowl first amongst them.
"Look who's finally awake."
Prowl's systems were almost up to speed, his door-wings still numbed but the rest of his inputs processing normally. He warmed his vocalisor, ready to speak and realised he wasn't at all certain what to say. His memory files of the last few orns were… hazy. Prowl wasn't at all sure he believed them. He couldn't possibly have seen half the things he'd thought he'd seen.
The memory of an over-exuberant embrace from Prime brought an involuntary flinch. Then his processor supplied a file of Ironhide generating the most awful caterwaul, and his senses threatened to shut right back down in protest.
Jazz's engine revved and Prowl started. His unintended silence had gone on long enough to concern the mechs around him.
"Prowl, are you fully functional?" Ratchet scowled. "How many fingers am I holding up?"
A worried silence stretched out. Prowl cycled his optics through a slow recalibration, thinking over the question and wondering about it. "None," he answered, finally deciding there was no alternative to the truth.
The worried expression on Jazz's face turned to alarm. He looked at Ratchet with a frown and a question. The medic himself let his servos drop and tightened his grip on the wrench he held, his optics flicking up to the readouts above Prowl's helm
The tactician cleared his vents, attracting the attention of both mechs before continuing. "You do not possess fingers. You had, however, raised three servo-digits, two on your left, and one on your right." He tilted his helm, frowning between the two of them. "Is this information relevant?"
Air rushed from Jazz's vents in a relieved gust. He shook his helm, chuckling. Ratchet cycled his optics, the scowl back in place as he glanced at Jazz.
"He'll do."
"There was a problem with the energon supply." The realisation burst from Prowl's vocalisor as the memory file dropped into place.
Jazz chuckled. The mech slipped off the berth he'd been perched on, moving forwards so Prowl didn't have to strain to see him.
"Hey, I like a good time as much as the next mech, but it'd be kind of polite to wait 'till I got back before getting started."
"The Autobots…?"
"All fine," Ratchet assured him. "Or they will be when their processors get over the after-effects." He nodded towards the saboteur, giving credit where it was due. "Jazz figured it out pretty quick."
Jazz waved a hand in dismissal. "Prowl was more than halfway there." He looked down at the tactician, his visor cycling through a wink. "Waking 'Comber was kind of genius there, Prowler."
A memory file swam into Prowl's processor, vague and almost entirely corrupted at point of recording. He shook it off. Jazz would fill in the gaps, he was sure. From the sound of it, it would be hard to stop him. First though, Prowl had another concern.
"The Decepticons…?"
Ratchet snorted. "Otherwise occupied." He waved a servo in Jazz's direction. "Blame this one."
A request for information was unnecessary. Prowl simply raised a brow-ridge and waited. He didn't believe Jazz's self-deprecating shrug for a moment. The lop-sided grin that followed hot in its tyre-tracks was closer to the truth.
"I went back with a present or two," Jazz smirked. Hopping up onto the berth next to Prowl's the saboteur kicked against its sides with his heel tyres. "Decided to do them a good turn. They're always complaining about lack of energy right?"
Curious, unable to resist Jazz's teasing, Prowl gave in and asked the question: "Jazz…what did you do?"
"Swapped out a few dozen of their cubes with ours." Jazz shrugged, a look of pious virtue on his faceplates. It was all Prowl could do not to laugh at the incongruity of it. "Figured they could use a good time about as much as we could use the standard grade right now."
"So this planet is now burdened with not one but two ships full of Cybertronians, each suffering from significant charge hangovers?"
Jazz shrugged. "Figured it would either give everyone a break or persuade the human diplomats to get off their afts and sign those treaties you drafted."
There was no avoiding it. Prowl laughed, both at the ridiculousness of the situation and at Jazz's matter-of-fact response to it.
Jazz grinned back at him, his relief and affection on open display. Ratchet cycled his optics at them both, one servo coming up to rub his own aching helm.
"Right." He pinned Prowl with a stern look and stepped forward, helping Prowl up to a seated position. "You: minimal duty, in your office or quarters. The blocks on your sensor wings will wear off in a few days – you will let me know if they give you any problems, or I'll set Jazz and Optimus Prime on you. If I see you in the Rec Room, you're back here. You don't need the over-stimulation right now."
Prowl wobbled where he sat and grimaced. "Agreed."
Jazz groaned theatrically. "The work I've put into luring him to the Rec Room and now you're banning it?"
Ratchet ignored the question. They all knew it was rhetorical at best.
Prowl rocked slightly, unbalanced by his numb door-wings and pounding processor-ache. Jazz stepped forward, a servo pressing firmly against Prowl's door-hinge and giving him the strong support he needed.
He glanced to one side, looking into a visor as warm and glad to see him as he was to see it in return.
"C'mon, Prowler," Jazz said, voice soft. "Let's get you out of here."
"Thank you." Prowl eased his legs over the side of the berth, and stood, his companion close at his side. He looked over at the mech, shaking his helm, and said the words he'd been longing to say for orns. "And, Jazz? Welcome home."
Jazz laughed. He slipped an arm around Prowl's waist, steadying him and hugging him with the same economical gesture. The mech looked around him, tapping his visor in farewell to Ratchet and leading Prowl out into the corridor beyond.
"Wouldn't change it for the world," he agreed.
The End