There are so many things to say about this chapter! One, Prowl is much more difficult to write than Jazz. At least with Jazz, I can relate to being an amoral psychopath with a burgeoning desire to possibly Do The Right Thing. Prowl, on the other hand... Well, being devoid of any form of emotion is technically a form of psychopathy, but not the fun kind. He made me work hard to get him just right. But that is okay. I am going to torture the ever-lovin' shit out of him, so I think we're even. ^_^
Also, if any of you are curious about Grimm, I would invite you to check out my DeviantART account (link in bio). It is where approximately twenty percent of WE material, including extras for Where You and I Collide, are dumped because they do not fit here. You might find the stories Spark Eater and A Grimm Story interesting. =P
And who can start a chapter without thanking all the wonderful reviewers who came before! There are hardly any words to describe my love for each and every single one of you! Thank you for your time and enthusiasm, your love and clever reviews! Thank you to renegadewriter8,Christarpax, Wanderling, CNightJoy, Jenn, Prowls-little-hetalian, VyxenSkye, Dvana, Lecidre, Qwertzu, Optimus Bob, zgjhgnfvhuijgdhf, TheVastraNararda, White Aster, IBrokeTheFourthWall, Nikkie2010, Camfield, Kidara, Alathea2, Haag, Stargazer at Moonlight, DemonSufer, Fianna9, Sideslip, Dusk Rain Fall, Guest, JennEvan, Gamemice, White Morticia, femme4jack, kathy3meme, StarscreamII, Peacewish, darkwolflink1, shadowstalker753, Jessie07, Daklog73, EmperialGem21, ice around the moon, evilbunny777, Queen of the Red Skittle, Move-2-da-beat-femme, Astsadi, kkcliffy, SonicDictionary, smileintothechaos, Agent Or4ng3, SunlightOnTheWater, and LucasVN. You guys keep me going, even when the writing makes me want to chew my own fingers off. ^_^
Where You and I Collide
Chapter 41
Hunter's infection had only grown worse during their flight to the Paxian outpost.
Tyger Pax's medics were there to greet them in a ship specifically outfitted for medical care – a rare ship to find amidst the armadas of stealth and warships. Too many of them were blown out of the sky with nothing but a stray shot, taking with them the lives of medics on board. It was best to keep the ships grounded, and the medics safe from harm; they were too valuable to risk their lives unnecessarily. Even more rare was to see that the Tyger Pax stronghold had leased their CMO for this field call.
It could hardly be called heartening to watch Grimm loom over Hunter's delirious frame like she was the physical manifestation of Death itself.
Though the medic said nothing, it was plain that Hunter was in dire condition. The scout no longer responded to outside stimulus. His armour was degrading at a frightening rate, rust spreading like a plague across his frame. Necrotic tissue sloughed off him in too similar as fashion to the experiments in Shockwave's lab. A putrid stench rose from him where infection had festered the worst. Through his delirium, Hunter alternated between hysteria and incoherent mumbling. His only peace was moments of unconsciousness, but even then he rested fitfully.
An anti-gravity berth was supplied by the two medical drones accompanying Grimm. Four generators were placed on the ground around Hunter, laser-guided to connect and engage with each other before expanding a force field between them that quickly and gently took form beneath Hunter's back. Two assistant medics hovered concernedly on either side of the generated berth, monitoring Hunter for any possible change in condition. Their optics travelled discreetly from the scout to Grimm, carefully keeping their expressions blank as their CMO hunched at Hunter's shoulder and observed with dead optics. Standard procedure for most medics was to scan their patient for a basic idea of their injuries; Grimm stood next to Hunter's frame and rested her hand just above the scout's caved-in chest. Her expression grew grimmer, which could only be a bad sign for a creature who happened to be called Grimm.
Hunter was motioned away by a gesture from her gnarled hand. Medics filed out in silent procession. Only the smell of rotted metal lingered within Putter-Poof's bowels.
Grimm left Prowl and Jazz in their ship without saying a single word to them.
In a way, they both preferred her silence. There was nothing she could have said that would have meant anything to either of them after spending orns listening to Hunter's pain. Words would have felt like false hope. And besides, not enough time had passed for them to forget the natural disaster that was her voice... nor could they forget the look on her faceplate as she had lurked in the hall after the Decepticon attack, dragging off two bots for her own means. It was best that she was gone from their sight, performing her function, and leaving the two of them to pretend she was not as disturbing as she actually was.
The medical ship was equipped with only one surgery bay. Few rooms for recharging. No wash racks, aside from spray nozzles within the surgery bay. Prowl and Jazz quickly relocated to the outpost's wash racks where they could finally scrub away several fortnights worth of grime. It was a sadly ill-equipped room whose amenities included only two blocks to sit upon, two pressure washers that supplied only water – though, thankfully, it was hot enough for their purposes - and an alkaline solution in a bottle that could never hope to wash away the amount of organic debris festering on, around, and inside their frames. Only a long, fortifying soak in a tub of acid would be able to slough off the evidence of Shockwave's labs – preferably something with a pH level of one or lower. Despite the setbacks, Prowl and Jazz made due with what they were given.
A single medic was spared for their care.
Jazz outright refused to be cared for. Prowl accepted medical assistance with alacrity. Considering his immediate medical condition, it was the most logical thing to do.
Now his destroyed arm laid in a pile of mess on the floor next to him, amputated as he has assumed it would be. It would not be long before he had a replacement. His frame was a basic model, not overly specialized as some bots could be. Wheeljack likely had the necessary parts on-hand and was in the process of building the replacement in anticipation of the tactician's return.
The medic who was treating him had an annoying habit of trying to engage in conversation with him. Nearly as unnecessary as Ratchet attempting to lecture his patients every time they came in for repairs.
"I am not interested in discussing anything at the moment," Prowl announced when he decided he no longer wanted to hear the medic's one-sided attempts.
"Oh," said the small minibot, appearing sympathetic rather than insulted. Considering that his CMO had a voice like a painful death, it was probably commonplace in their med bay for patients to tell them to stop talking. "Of course. I'm very sorry. I imagine this must be a difficult time for you. If it means anything, Hunter is in very skilled hands. Grimm is an expert with spark care. You might say she has a very special way of dealing with them..."
"Because she eats them in her spare time?" Jazz snorted from his seat on the second block in the wash racks.
The medic twittered nervously, his smile brittle when he offered it to the saboteur.
Standing just inside the doorway of the cramped wash racks, green armour shifted and tartan accents caught under the lights. Chester, Head Tactician Adviser of Tyger Pax, flashed a disapproving frown in Jazz's direction, which the saboteur expertly ignored.
Prowl stared blankly at the medic kneeling at his side until the bot grew nervous, quickly returning to his work reordering the tangled chaos that was the tactician's disturbed insides. Notably, the medic was now completely silent and did not appear to have any desire to attempt another conversation. Prowl continued to watch the bot for several breems, gauging how steady his hands were, how confident he appeared in dealing with complex wiring. Deciding the medic's work was satisfactory, Prowl left him to his work in order to observe the exchange taking place between his partner and his fellow Tactical Adviser.
"She doesn't eat sparks in her spare time," Chester said flatly, still frowning.
"Can't prove it. She don't leave behind any evidence," Jazz countered with a shrug, his mouthplates curved in a smirk. He wasn't being serious about his accusations, his amusement stemming from the fact that he knew he was bothering Chester. "She eats the spark and then harvests the frame ta be used for her living patients. It's a perfect setup."
"What makes you think she'd do that?"
"'Cause that's exactly what Ah'd do if Ah was a terrifying creature of the night that ate sparks."
Chester's optics narrowed. "You already are a terrifying creature of the night."
"Yeah, but Ah don't eat sparks."
"And neither does Grimm."
"Can't prove it."
Prowl stared at the tactician with his own frown, being mostly ignored by the other two bots. It was not logical for Tyger Pax to send their Head Tactical Adviser as security detail. It was not logical to send any form of tactician. It was a waste of resources. There were other bots who were trained and better equipped for security detail, such as frontliners, weapon specialists. Even Special Ops or Intelligence & Espionage made better sense. Chester should have turned down the detail and assigned it to a lower-ranking bot equipped for the duty. The fact that a fellow tactician, a Head Tactical Adviser for that matter, was performing an illogical task was bothersome.
Before Jazz's needling could escalate, Prowl cut in with a decided lack of social grace.
"Why are you here?"
Jazz's grin faltered as his gaze tracked back to his partner, watching him for a second, before turning back to Chester. "He was talkin' ta ya."
"I assumed as much, since it would be awkward if he were wondering why you were here."
The corner of Jazz's mouthplate twitched "Well? Ya gonna answer him?"
Chester looked like he would rather draw his weapon on the saboteur. He showed a remarkable amount of restraint in not doing so. He drew a drag of air in through his vents, and then make a face as if he had just scented something awful. His stare was accusatory as he looked between Prowl and Jazz, and Prowl inclined his head to acknowledge that, yes, he and his partner were still rancid from the organic decay that had adhered to their frames for a fortnight. They would likely smell of it for a long time to come. No, neither Prowl nor Jazz would go into detail about why they smelled of organic decay or where the organic decay came from.
Though the words were unspoken, Chester understood them. His mouthplates twitched, and then his olfactory sensor was shut down. When he delivered his answer, it was direct and concise. Something to be expected of an efficient tactician.
"I am here because Grimm and her medics are the most valuable resources we have and it was decided that I was the best to handle Grimm's unusual deposition."
"As an evil spark-eating monster," Jazz added smartly.
Prowl grimaced when the hands inside his chest cavity fumbled for a second, a brief snort of laughter lifting from the medic. The laughter stopped the moment Prowl fixed the bot with a cold stare. There was no laughter after that, only work... and a little bit of fear.
Chester's mouthplates thinned into a straight line as he refused to let Jazz bait him.
"I can concede to the fact that our medics are among the most valuable resources we have," Prowl allowed coolly. "That still does not explain why you, specifically, were chosen for security detail. If such a precious resource needs to be protected, then send along bots who are better equipped to do so and less integral to the function of a whole division. I am aware of a partial roster in Tyger Pax and can think of several warriors better suited to this task than you."
Instead of directly responding to the veiled insult that Chester was one hundred percent sure Prowl was completely unaware he had just delivered, he said, "When I saw you in Tyger Pax, I honestly thought that you had changed, but it appears that I was wrong. Our last meeting must have been a fluke. You have not changed at all."
Prowl failed to realize he had just been insulted.
Jazz, on the other hand, happened to know that Prowl had been insulted. He figured he'd tell his partner later, when he had the emotions to care about such things. It'd be funnier that way. For now, he enjoyed the bickering between two tactical commanders. They bickered in the same way they were programmed to do everything else: in a cold and calculated manner. Prowl likely did not even realize he was bickering with someone, because it was not logical to bicker with a fellow Autobot of similar rank.
For the time being, Jazz relaxed to the soothing sounds of two tacticians hurtling veiled insults at each other. It had been a pit of a mission and he was tired now. His fingers had a lot of damage to them and he was determined to have them fixed up to the best of his ability before he started considering other things – like Hunter's chances of making it through surgery, and how he was going to handle Prowl when it came time to deal with him. The way he figured things were going, it was best to just fix one thing before starting on all the other problems.
"Furthermore," the Iacon tactician pressed on as if he had not been interrupted, "you had personal business with Grimm previous to this mission. Some form of personal feud that you allowed to interfere with your professional business to the point that you refused to even consult with her. Even your second in command refused to consult with her. This is not the mark of someone who I would readily entrust the lives of the Chief Medical Officer or her subordinates."
"Thankfully, it is not your place nor your business to questions the actions of Tyger Pax. Who you would and would not entrust the safety of our medics to is no concern to anyone but yourself," Chester replied. "If you do not recall, it has been over two fortnights since you were last at my base. In that time, Grimm and I have reconciled our differences. We are now perfectly capable of working with each other on a personal and professional level. Her safety, as well as the safety of her medics, is paramount to me."
"That does not explain why you were chosen."
"Perhaps because I requested the detail?"
"That was illogical of you."
"For what reason?"
"You are not a warrior. You are a tactician." Prowl could not understand why the other tactician simply did not see the truth of it. It was straightforward, simple, and finite. Why fight him on something that he was clearly right about?
Chester's optics glinted something icy. "I realize that shades of grey are not your speciality, Prowl, but I am as much a warrior as any Autobot. I can hold my own in battle, and I can defend my charges if the need arises."
A long sigh of air breezed out Prowl's vents. He was running out of reasonable points for Chester to acknowledge, and he was loathe to keep repeating himself. Being unreasonable was more of Jazz's speciality, but one glance in his partner's direction said that Jazz was not interested in inserting himself at this time, Any attempts to engage him would be met badly. Weighing his options, Prowl decided that Jazz was better left to his own devices as he attempted to fix his fingers by himself.
"I am not saying that you cannot hold your own in battle-"
"Merely implying it."
"-but you must admit to the highly illogical notion of a high-ranking commander such as yourself taking on security detail when they are many others available for the task? To that point, should there not be more members of a security detail, rather than a single bot?"
The Paxian's patience finally rung out, his frown reduced to a scowl. "There are no others."
Prowl paused, canting his head. He replayed the statement in his head, and then said, "I beg your pardon?"
He felt the hands dealing with his wiring pause. The medic hissed a soft breath out his vents, his gaze firmly planted on the floor. Prowl could see the lines in his frame were tense, bracing himself for the next words.
"I said there are no others," Chester gritted out hoarsely. "Tyger Pax was recently attacked and we took heavy causalities. A lot of our bots were executed during the Decepticon takeover, or killed during the fight to get the base back. We couldn't spare the base any major protection in the condition that it's in, not on a field call like this, so I volunteered to come. In this case, I was expendable."
From his periphery, Prowl saw Jazz glance over with an arch look. There was warning in the saboteur's unshielded gaze, trying to say something to Prowl without being blunt and loud about it. Whatever the message was, Prowl missed it, while being perfectly aware that if his emotional centere had been turned on, he would have understood exactly what that look meant. He spoke anyways, and promptly made an aft of himself.
"Not everyone on your base is dead. Someone else still could have come," he said. "In light of such a severe attack, it is more important than ever that you remain on base to help restore order. My observation remains that it was illogical of you to place yourself on security detail when someone else of lower rank could have been spared."
Chester swore tightly in a low voice, his gaze narrowing to flashing lasers. "As it was illogical of you to leave your division for several fortnights on complete radio silence? As illogical as leaving Smokescreen in charge of them all? We both know that Smokescreen is good as a temporary, but he lacks the focus and drive for long term, high-stress assignments. This is in contrast to myself, who will be absent for a few orns from Tyger Pax, but am still able to stay in contact with my base the whole time. Who is being more illogical here, Prowl? Answer me this."
There was silence.
Prowl sat tensely on the block with his mouthplates trained into a line thin enough as to disappear off his faceplate. He knew when he was beaten, as unlikely as the situation was. Perhaps pride transcended his emotional status, or it was more likely case of ingrained stubbornness in his core programming that insisted his superior reasoning skills, that prevented him from accepting the unlikelihood of him being wrong. He was a tactical officer of the Simfur Capitol City Security Response; there were none whose programming rivalled that pedigree. Since defeat was not in his repertoire, he continued to sit on the block and make optic contact with Chester until the other tactician looked away with a sound of disgust.
"This argument was pointless," Chester snorted. "Get fixed up and then take your ship and go home. As you rightly pointed out, I have a base I need to get back to and I don't need to be wasting anymore time here."
With a flash of his tartan accents under the lights, Chester was gone.
Prowl continued to stare at the door, even though it was closed and there was no need to stare at it any longer.
Jazz pushed himself around on his block to face him. He wagged a finger at his partner, though the finger was not attached to the rest of him – rather, it was clutched in the opposite hand and being wagged with impunity.
"Stop it," Prowl commanded.
"No," Jazz replied. He looked their medical company over with a suspicious optic, frowning, and then deigned the poor schmuck a non-threat. He addressed Prowl with an arch look. "See what happens when ya turn some stuff off and leave others running? Ya turn into an aft and lose all your friends."
"I do not have any friends."
"Not with that attitude, ya don't."
"I do not have an attitude right now. There is a distinct absence of attitude."
"That's what ya think."
Prowl opened his mouthplates to reply that what he thought was absolutely correct. He could have no attitude if there was an absolute absence of all emotion that would set the precedent for an attitude. However, he closed his mouthplates a moment later when his battle computer alerted him to an elevated threat level in the room. Jazz had subtly angled his frame, watching him for the next move. Coiled tension settled in the saboteur's legs, while the fingers that remained attached on his hands curled ever so slightly into the beginnings of fists. An intentional telegraph as a means of silently warning him that the saboteur's patience had finally run out.
Given that Prowl was currently out an arm, and the rest of him was undergoing extensive rewiring, he was at the disadvantage. There was no point in antagonizing his partner. It would only give Jazz reason to enjoy Prowl's pain later in the evening when they convened to turn his emotional centre back on. The littlest provocation would likely incite Jazz to make the transition even more painful than it had to be.
"Um...Not to interrupt you two, but..." intoned the medic, instantly becoming the target of two very intense stares. He sat back on his heels and tried not to wither under their combined gazes. His fingers were wet with energon from a displaced valve he had been readjusting.
"Have you found something amiss?" Prowl enquired curtly.
"More than a little something, but at least you are better off compared to that poor scout you brought in," was the tired reply. "Your wiring is fine; most of it can be untangled and reset right here. There are some wire bundles than have corroded beyond salvaging, so I will have to cut them out. Don't worry, though - there are several spools of wire in med stock on the ship." A pair of shoulders shrugged haplessly. "Structurally speaking... I don't know what you two did down in the Pole, but you managed some impressive damage. Unfortunately, you've left your wounds to heal on their own for too long. A lot of it has set wrong."
"I assumed as much," Prowl stated flatly.
With a nod, the medic continued. "Your shoulder is the worst of it; the endoskeleton is practically gone, and what's left is already necrotic with rusted metal. You got off lucky with having your interfacial port destroyed, or else you might have risked having the corrosion spread into the operational hub, and from there into your processor."
"A lucky break, then?" Jazz wondered lightly.
"Sure, you can call it that." Skilled hands flicked off drying energon, rearranging tools on the tiled floor in a distracted manner as to give him an excuse not to meet Jazz's gaze. "Once I am done here, I am going to write up a few recommendations to send to Ratchet. Since of a lot of the damages here are as a consequence of leaving the initial damages for too long, I suspect that your medic is simply going to cut out most of the internal structure and replace it with a new endoskeleton when he replaces your arm. You'll get a new interfacial port with the reconstruction, of course. Most medics would go that route; it's easier than trying to reset warped metal with this level of rust already set in. Give it an orn or two and this whole section will be dead anyways."
Prowl sat back, carefully considering the information he had just been given. It all sounded perfectly logical to him. He inclined his head and said, "I understand."
"This is just so you are prepared for surgery when you get to Iacon," was the needlessly reassuring answer. "There is no sense in not having you prepared for treatment. I can give you something for the pain and infection in the meantime. It's not very strong, so you will still be able to fly to Iacon, but it should lessen your discomfort for the time being."
Jazz revved shortly. "How much longer are ya gonna be working on him?"
"It may take a few more joors to get everything sorted out to my satisfaction. I don't want to leave anything to chance right now. Infection and rust are two things to never take lightly. Although..." He made an slightly irritated expression. "It won't be as long as it could be. I have a feeling I wouldn't be welcomed inside his head to see what kinds of EM damage the Pole did on his processor..."
"You are not welcome inside my head," Prowl commanded sharply. "I am aware of the damages. They are not pressing at the moment; they will be repaired at my convenience."
The medic flinched, keeping his optics firmly fixed on the floor. "Figured as much. So, yeah... at the very least, give me another two joors to sort everything out."
"Alright, two joors," Jazz agreed. "It'll give meh time ta scope this place out and find a space ta crash for the night."
"We have rooms prepared for you on our ship. That should be alright, shouldn't it?" Tools chinked together, rearranging them again, preparing to delve back into the literal inner workings of the Head Tactical Adviser of Iacon.
"No offence, but your ship isn't what Ah need right now," Jazz dismissed.
In a single, fluid movement, he slide from the washing block to stand tall, stretching his back to the sound of snapping and cracking as his spinal column reset itself. Prowl watched with a critical optic, noting a slight favour to Jazz's right side; there was a problem with his left arm, causing him to lean away from it. It was most likely a seized tension wire as a consequence of their climb down the ice wall into Shockwave's gorge. He showed no outward discomfort, gave no sign he wished for the Paxian medic to examine his arm, and Prowl suspected that Jazz was waiting to get back to Iacon so that someone he knew could treat him.
Prowl's optics jerked up when he realized his lingering gaze had been caught.
"Come find meh when you're done here," Jazz ordered, once again wagging his unattached finger.
"When I am ready, I will come find you," Prowl replied.
The saboteur measured him with a shrewd glance, his mouthplates subtly curving downward at the corners. "Yeah, let's see how long that takes."
Prowl did not seek out Jazz when he was done with the medic. As he had specified, he was not ready yet.
Long before his rewiring was complete, it had been decided that there were far more pressing matters to attend to before he appealed upon Jazz to assist him in turning his centre back on. Chester had been right; it had been far too long since Prowl had checked in on his division. He had been negligent of his position within the Autobots – a mistake that could easily be rectified with a quick call.
Never mind that there was a distinct part of his battle computer currently informing him that his actions were merely stalling for the inevitable.
Prowl decided that the inevitable would still be there waiting for him when he was done his call.
The time difference between the two territories made it night in Iacon while Tyger Pax was only settling into early evening. Given the distance between the outpost and the intended recipients, it took some time to sort through the available transmission bands before Prowl was able to bounce the signal through Tyger Pax's main base's communications hub and piggyback it through subsequent communications towers before he was able to make contact with Iacon. He was no agent for Special Ops, and certainly no spy for Intelligence & Espionage, but Prowl's skills in discreet communication were adequate enough that his calculated chances of being intercepted were low enough to be satisfactory.
Prowl's call required the on-duty communications officer to wake Smokescreen from an early recharge and reroute the call to the tactician's quarters. Smokescreen's initial relief to see his brother alive and in almost one piece had quickly devolved into irritation when the secondary tactician realized the call was for business, not pleasure. His mood soured further when it became clear that Prowl disapproved of Smokesceen's company – two drowsy but comfortable mechs from Intelligence & Espionage. They were required to leave before Smokescreen was allowed to recount any of the pertinent information his commander was requesting.
Smokescreen did not need his own detached tactical analysis module to know the (un)likelihood of hearing from his companions again.
"...and that is pretty much sums up everything that has happened in Iacon since you left," the proxy tactician concluded flatly after feeling like he had been forced to talk for joors. It had really only been a few breems, but being with an emotionless Prowl made time feel like it slowed to a painful grind. "Can I go back to recharge now?"
"No."
Prowl watched as patience gave way to a burst of irritation. Smokescreen's hands flashed across the screen in a rude gesture. Air gushed out his vents. Prowl waited for the outburst he knew was coming.
"What else could you possibly want from me? I am running on fumes here, commander! I have been waiting for fortnights to hear any possible news that you are alive! At the very least, I have been waiting for news that Jazz spliced you down to your core parts and was selling you for scrap to the Neutrals! By the looks of things, he's already started!"
Prowl glanced down at the patch that had been placed over the open hole where his arm had been. He looked back at Smokescreen and said, "My arm was damaged beyond repair. The medic amputated it a few joors ago."
"Amputated? Primus, Prowl! What the frag have you been doing to need an arm amputated?"
"This line is not secured enough to discuss the details of our mission. When I return to Iacon, you may read the details in my report. For now, it is of no concern to you."
There was more flailing arm gestures across the screen. A mixture of incredulous sounds and cursing unbecoming of a second-in-command spewed through the speakers. His fussing was at such a volume that Prowl had no doubt that the staff of the outpost was able to hear it; if he got any louder, the medics on their ship in the docking yard out back would be able to hear. It went without saying what the bot in the rooms bordering Smokescreen's could hear.
"Calm down, Smokescreen."
"Don't tell me to calm down! Just because you can't freak out right now doesn't mean I can't! You call me in the middle of the night, dismiss my company, get me to recite to you the itinerary of our division, tell me not to worry over the fact that you are missing an arm, and I am supposed to be calm?"
"Yes, and I should point out that a certain amount of professionalism would not hurt either."
"ARGH!" Smokescreen exclaimed, his hands curling in front of him as if he meant to take Prowl's neck between his fingers. "Do you have any idea that this is the first time in four orns that I have been able to recharge? I have been working myself to the bolts trying to keep up with everything! You left me acting as both commander and second-in-command! You should not be messing with me right now!"
"Be more organized," Prowl offered. "You acted in my place when I was a prisoner in Straxis. I do not see how this would be different."
A squeal came out of Smokescreen's vocal processor that was wholly inappropriate.
Pounding static came over the speakers, followed by a bellowed curse from one of Smokescreen's neighbours. Words were exchanged. Prowl did not bother to listen, only waiting until he was sure that he had his second's undivided attention. Soon enough, the ire of Iacon's Proxy Tactical Adviser waned into exhaustion; he slumped forward and stared at Prowl with dead optics. A rough hand scrubbed across his faceplate. Exhaustion dulled his normally handsome features. Armour that was normally glossy had turned scuffed and dusty from neglect.
"I am going to honest with you, Prowl. I have missed you, and I have worried for you while you've been away, but there are some parts of you I have definitely not missed."
"Missing the whole, but not its parts does not make any sense."
"Tell that to a gestalt team," Smokescreen snorted. "If you had your you-know-what turned on, you'd understand exactly what I meant."
Prowl stared at his subordinate through the blue glare of the screen, his expression remaining impassive. "I know exactly what you meant. I was simply pointing out that it didn't make any sense."
"Neither does my desire to jump through the screen and hit you, but I still want to do it," Smokescreen replied, then he seemed to realize that letting his exhaustion turn to anger was going to get him nowhere. He dragged in a heavy breath of air to let it cycle through his frame, after which he appeared to find a second calm and a smidgeon of professionalism. "You've been away for too long, Prowl."
His red chevron glinted in the low light of the station's small central hub as he inclined his head. "I realize now that I have been away for too long; this was not my intention when I first left. My neglect of my own division has been pointed out to me, and my contacting you is a means of rectifying the situation."
"Better late than never, I suppose," Smokescreen sighed. "I know I have told you this before, but I hate being you. I hate being in charge of this fragging division. I don't have the same obsessive-compulsive psychotically focused drive for it as you do."
"We possess identical core programming."
"At one time, we also possessed identical frames," Smokescreen riposted with a roll of his optics. "Programming evolves; mine went one way, yours went the other. I don't have any aspirations for your function. You are welcome to it. The sooner you get back, the better."
"I can accept that," Prowl announced with a nod. "You would make a poor commander for the tactical division, comparatively speaking, despite our identical core programming."
Static blustered over the speakers with the sound of Smokescreen's disgust, his faceplate disappearing into the cup of his palms. He shook his head back and forth slowly.
"Can I go back to recharge now?"
"Alright, if you insist."
"Thank you."
"You are welcome, not that this exchange has yielded anything significant," Prowl dismissed, already reaching for the console controls. "Before we part ways, you may want to know that Kingpin is now dead. Jazz put a blade through his head. Hunter was shot in the chest and has been undergoing major surgery all orn to save him. He may still die from systemic infection."
Smokescreen's faceplate flashed in horror before Prowl cut the channel.
Overhead, the lights flickered and dimmed as if caught in a minor power surge. A small noise alerted the tactician to the presence of company, followed a mere fraction of an astrosecond later by the appearance of a spark signature as if it were an afterthought on Prowl's spark resonance scanners. The sound of the squeaky swivel on his chair was nearly obscene in the quiet of the small room. Tension shot down his spinal column when his gaze ghosted over a dark figure lurking in the darkened entryway of the command hub. Grimm blinked at him with her strangely dead-looking optics, her frame nearly fading from view between the darkness of the hallway and the flickering dimness of the command hub.
"And I thought I was a monster."
A tremor ran down Prowl's spinal column. In his chest, his spark constricted tightly. Though he was not able to have an emotional response to Grimm's unusual voice, it seemed his frame was fully capable of reacting to it physically. A visceral, primitive reaction that burrowed into the unconscious and superseded logic.
Grimm canted her narrow head. She opened her mouthplates, and the room resonated deeply with the grating sound of tectonic plates grinding against each other. "But... even monsters feel things. You don't feel things, do you? Not right now, anyways."
"How long have you been standing there?" Prowl demanded, rising to his full height with a harsh jolt. "How long have you had a dampener active?"
"Dampener?" A dark optic ridge arched over a dead blue optic. There was almost humour in that gaze.
Prowl crossed the room in two long strides, pushing the medic back to hold her against the far wall of the hallway. She was so small and light, the strength of his one arm was all it took to pin her by the centre of her chest; he forced the hunch of her spinal column to snap straight with a loud crack. If it hurt, Grimm revealed nothing. Her armour was colder than the ambient temperature; not like ice, but like a corpse. His battle computer ripped a memory to the forefront, of Jazz touching him in the Poles and feeling the frigidness of his armour. A secondary memory activated: the image of Grimm hunched in the hallway of Tyger Pax base, claiming the frames of the invading Decepticons as she dragged them off for her own purposes.
There was no question that his battle computer considered Grimm a threat, but it was having trouble deciding how she was a threat.
"How long were you there, Grimm?" Prowl insisted tightly.
"As long as I have been out of surgery. I thought you might have wanted to know Hunter's post-surgery status, so I waited."
"That was a private conversation you were eavesdropping on."
"Then you should have locked the door." She glanced down at the hand that pinned her. "This is uncomfortable."
"This is improper conduct between fellow commanding officers," Prowl corrected her. "However, you have currently been deigned a threat."
"Only just now?"
Prowl pressed his hand deeper into Grimm's cold chest. "I cannot decide how great of a threat you are. Until that is decided, proper conduct will not be observed. You will stay where you are."
"I have never harmed anyone who did not deserve it. Same as you, I suppose. Same as any Autobot," Grimm replied, each of her words seeming to crash through the darkness like great avalanches rife with screaming victims. "You are larger than I am, stronger, faster. What threat am I to you?"
"I do not know."
"That is not very logical of you, Prowl – fearing something you do not understand." She blinked slowly, hiding that dead stare for all but an astrosecond. The dread sound of her voice wrenched inside of his frame, an adverse physical reaction that felt as if his spark were being wrenched in a vice. He jerked away to protect himself, allowing Grimm to fall to the floor like an abandoned drone. She even rattled like empty oil cans when she hit.
"What would you know of logical? Is that what you heard Smokescreen and I discussing? Are you going to report me for my inappropriate management of my emotions?" he demanded, looming darkly over the medic, watching as she collected herself from the floor and regained her hunched shape.
"I would know very little of logical," she replied like a slow death. "I heard very little of your discussion. It does not take an eavesdropper to figure out what is wrong with you; it only takes someone of..." She paused, and then offered a smile that was better off never existing in the world. "Well, of my specific talents."
"A medic."
"With a speciality in sparks." Grimm's smile stayed in place, and the longer it stayed the more it looked like a gaping chasm into the depths of a bottomless pit. "Admittedly, your problem is all in your head, but it affects your spark all the same. A dam can only hold for so long before the pressure behind it grows too great. Cracks are inevitable. When that dam finally breaks, you might burst from the flood."
"I am functioning with acceptable parameters."
"With parameters like those, Hunter is also functioning within acceptable parameters – and I will have you know that I was forced to remove his full processor and spark to save his life," Grimm sneered wretchedly. "He is currently floating frameless in the surgery bay on life-support, and he will remain like that until a new frame can be established for him. But clearly he is functioning within acceptable parameters, just as you are."
"You had to remove his spark?" Prowl murmured, stepping back.
"The infection spread right down into the metal of his sparkcase. He was suffering energon poisoning, tank corrosion, widespread necrotic damage to his internal systems – it is extraordinary that he managed to hold on long enough to get here. There was damage to his processor, but his spark is undamaged; weak from haemorrhaging energy this whole time, but he will live."
"How?" Prowl pressed.
"Because I won't let him fade." Her smile finally fell into seriousness. "My speciality is sparks, after all."
"You are not like any other medic I have ever known," Prowl pointed out.
"I don't suppose I am." Grimm shrugged, looking away into the darkness of the hall. "You are not like any other tactician I have ever known. That makes us even, does it not?"
From down the hall, there came the sound of pounding footsteps. Bright optics and a familiar spark signature flew around the corner, revealing Chester as he barrelled his way through the dark. His gaze unerringly found Grimm, not liking the way Prowl appeared to be backing her into the wall. He was between them in a flash, guiding Grimm behind the wall of his frame while sizing Prowl up with a hard look.
"What in the name of Prime do you think you are doing?"
"It was nothing, Chester," Grimm intoned, laying a calming hand to the tactician's arm. "I was merely informing Prowl about Hunter."
"And that requires him to stand so close? Was his hearing damaged like his arm?"
"No," Prowl replied flatly.
"I can take care of myself. There was no need to worry," Grimm said, patting Chester's arm. Somehow, Chester was unaffected by the guttural sound of the medic's horrible voice. "Come, let us return to the ship and let Prowl get some rest for the night. He and Jazz still have a long journey to make."
Prowl continued to stare down at the strange medic, catching her subtle nod. His battle computer still deigned her as some form of unknown threat, but the statistical probably of danger to himself was dropping. Grimm would not report him for the abuse of his emotional centre, despite the fact that it would be negligent of her function. It would not be the forst secret she had ever kept.
"You will find Jazz in the generator room," she said. "He is waiting for you."
With a gentle tug on Chester's arm, Grimm left with the tactician by her side.
Grimm's shadow, on the other hand, followed along several steps behind – out of sync with the owner, and seeming to walk backwards so as to keep an optic on Prowl.
Jazz's impatience was nearly palpable when Prowl pushed open the door to the generator room and spied his partner pacing next to the far wall.
"Ya know Ah hate waiting," snapped the silver bot.
"You hate being alone," Prowl corrected.
"Semantics," Jazz sneered.
Prowl huffed a breath of air out of his vents, letting it serve as his non-answer.
In a rush of quicksilver, Jazz was suddenly standing in front of him. The lack of visor made his optics stand out like bright beacons; gaze sharper than blades made of diamonds.
"That medic did a good job rewiring ya," the saboteur commented, taking his time to lean away.
"Yes, he did."
Jazz glanced upward to the ceiling that was little more than raw pyrite from the cliff where the outpost sat. Then his gaze returned with the same diamond-edged intensity. "Why were ya up there so long?"
"I needed to speak with Smokescreen." Prowl stepped out from under the direct line of Jazz's scrutiny, making his way around one of the large, humming generators. There were only two of them, both old and basic in design. Their noise was loud, but not loud enough as to muffle their conversation. They threw off enough heat as to make the room warmer than the level above, but not so much as to evaporate the air out of the room and make it uncomfortable.
"So ya spoke with him?
"Yes."
Jazz was moving as well, moving as a mirror to Prowl. He slipped along the shadows of the opposite wall, making no noise discernible above the steady hum of the machines between them.
They came to the far wall at the same time, turning to each other. Prowl stared down at the makeshift berth that had been put together. It was a single berth of moderate condition, likely snatched from the Paxian medical ship. Several disinfected polyurethane covers were piled on top, also stolen from the medical cache aboard the ship. Soft covers with a silicone filling, meant to cushion injured bots so that their own weight did not do them damage. They had been gathered for Prowl's own comfort, as well as Jazz's.
Jazz walked over to the pile of nonsense he had gathered together, the tip of his foot nudging one of the polyurethane covers.
"Ah'll give them back in the morning. When we're done with them."
"You gathered them for tonight?"
Jazz sent him a look like Prowl was halfway stupid.
"Of course Ah got them for tonight. If we're gonna do what Ah promised we were gonna do, Ah don't want ta be thrashing around all over the floor, scratching up mah paint and ruining mah gloss. Ya got a lot of baggage up there that needs unpacking and, Ah'm not gonna lie, it's probably gonna hurt both of us."
Prowl nodded, closing the distance between himself and the berth on the floor. He crouched down and lifted one of the covers, testing its weight and durability between his fingers. It was blue. Another was black. Standard colours that would hide the evidence of energon stains. He could feel the gel-like consistency of the silicone inside.
"This was a good precaution," he said.
"Ah thought so," Jazz shrugged. He came within arm's reach of Prowl, close enough that the tactician felt the shift in the air. A silver hand reached out, as if meaning to touch him.
"You are still missing one of your fingers," Prowl noted.
The hand fell back to its owner's side. "The joints are completely stripped," Jazz lamented. "Ratchet is gonna have ta put it back on when we get home."
"I see."
Jazz heaved a sigh and sat down on the berth, pushing his back against the wall. With the hand that was still missing a finger, he beckoned Prowl to sit next to him. Prowl accepted the invitation, grimacing as his back laid against the lukewarm wall and irritated his doorwings. They sat quietly until Prowl picked up Jazz's hand to examine it. The claws were ground down to nothing, and the knuckles still showed significant damage; Jazz had managed only to clean and set them straight. Everything else would have to heal and grow back in its own time.
"What did ya talk with Smokescreen about?" the saboteur wondered.
"The status of my division, among other things," Prowl replied, bending each of Jazz's fingers in turn to watch the mechanics move. The hand did not look right without the usual diamond-treated claws. "We established I have no sense of social etiquette."
"Ah thought we already established that earlier?" Jazz snorted.
"Perhaps we did," Prowl conceded with a shrug.
"The longer ya keep your centre turned off, the harder it is ta be around ya. It's like ya start deleting bits and pieces of your social etiquette data files ta make room for ways that ya can be an aft ta other bots."
"As opposed to you, who never had social etiquette files to begin with."
Jazz laughed one of his rare, honest laughs that was only enhanced by the smooth drone of the generators. "Even when ya have no sense of humour, ya still have a sense of humour." A playful elbow nudged Prowl in the side.
The tactician sighed through his vents. He had the vague sense of being left out because he did not have the ability to laugh. It was best that he change the subject. "I also encountered Grimm before coming down here."
Jazz sat up straighter, taking his hand back into his own lap. "Did ya ask her about what she did with those two Decepticons she dragged away?"
"No." In hindsight, that would have been an excellent question to pose to her.
White optics shone brightly as they perused Prowl's frame. An optic ridge arched. "Did she try to eat your spark?"
"She informed me of Hunter's status. He will need to be reformatted, but in the meantime he is on frame-separated life-support."
"Ouch. Did she say if he would make it?"
"She said she would not let his spark fade."
"Sounds like a good enough guarantee ta meh." Jazz was careful to lean his weight against Prowl's good shoulder. An impish smile taunted at the corners of his mouthplates. "And then did she try to eat your spark?"
Prowl revved deeply in his chest, knowing that when his emotional centre came back on the first thing that would probably hit him would be the irritation he was supposed to be feeling now.
"She did not try to eat my spark, because she is not a spark-eater. There is no such thing as spark-eaters. There has never been such thing as a spark-eater, nor will there ever be anything like a spark-eater."
"Ah know that," Jazz snorted, and then arched his optic ridges conspiratorially. "But does she know that?"
"Jazz."
Another brief burst of laughter blended into the hum of the generators, settling into quiet chuckles. "Ya would have laughed if ya had your emotions."
Prowl frowned in consideration. "Maybe."
Jazz cycled air through is vents, his faceplate creasing into frown lines. "We're stalling, aren't we?"
"I do not know of many bots who intentionally seek out pain," Prowl reasoned.
"The Twins are special like that," Jazz joked, but it was a lame joke that he only breathed a humoured noise for.
"We shouldn't put this off any longer," Prowl sighed. "How do you propose we go about this?"
"Lower the lights, get comfortable, start with a little foreplay...?"
"Jazz, really. I meant how do you mean to connect with me without an interfacial port?"
Jazz harrumphed, shifting around in the nest of covers. "Ah'll crack your head open, find mahself a decent motherboard ta hook up ta, stick mah cable into your head, switch on your centre, and hold on for the ride."
Prowl touched the side of his head, feeling around for the crease he knew was there. He tapped it when he found it. "You can connect right here. Do you still have those tools you were working with to repair your fingers?"
Jazz was already reaching into subspace for his tools, choosing the smallest one with the most delicate head to deal with the small screws that kept the armour on Prowl's head anchored. His hands were gentle as they guided him down into Jazz's lap, turning him the right way so bolts painted storm grey would show up in the light. The seal of the paint cracked with the motions of the screwdriver.
"The things Ah do for ya, Prowl."
Prowl kept his gaze on the floor, contemplating what was about to happen. Bracing himself was what he was about to feel. He listened as the seal between armour slates cracked open. It was hard to describe the feeling of lukewarm air rushing into his opened cranial cavity, or the feeling of careful fingers reaching in to poke aside innards to get to the proper motherboard.
Jazz's interface panel cracked open with a soft hiss. "Give meh a second ta adapt the connector. It's been a while since Ah've dug into any bot's head like this."
"I understand."
The trans-scan was cool against the side of his head, barely a touch at all except for the awareness of the ghost-like caress. From the periphery, Prowl watched as the tip of Jazz's cable broke apart and rearranged with expert grace. The saboteur scanned the cable just to be sure of it, holding it in comparison to the motherboard. His white gaze was as exacting as a surgeon's. With his free hand, he traced the sharp edge of Prowl's chevron.
"This first part isn't gonna hurt, but the rest of it will. Shut down your vocal processor. If ya can shut down motor control to your lower-half, it will keep ya from thrashing badly."
"I can do that." He was already in the process of doing it. His lower half went numb, limp; he stared down at the appendages, and they were like strangers attached to him. His vocal processor powered down, muting him for the time being.
A sigh drifted from Jazz's vents. He slipped his cable into Prowl's head and let the connector do what it had been made to do; it touched the circuitry of Prowl's main motherboard and latched on like a space-barnacle. There was no pleasantly detached feeling as there was with connecting the traditional way. This was sharp and invasive, instantly bracing like a blast from a sandblaster. Jazz's presence was undeniable, larger than life within the incorporeal realm of the mind; he was a whirlwind, a dervish of thoughts, schemes, plots, and possibilities.
No longer willing to put off the inevitable, Prowl lit the way through his synapses for Jazz to find his centre. The saboteur's touch was like fire upon a raw neural circuit. His fingers clenched in silver armour, gouging the paint.
"Sorry," Jazz sighed, working at Prowl's fingers until he let go. He wriggled until he lay parallel with his partner, so that they lay equal with each other. Through the connection, it was no secret that Jazz wanted to see Prowl's faceplate. Not to enjoy the pain, but so that he could acknowledge it. He was about to be a part of it, and somehow seeing it made sense to him.
Prowl shuttered his optics, falling limp against the soft catch of the polyurethane covers. Jazz's presence became stronger within his mind as the saboteur built up the data syphon that would buffer the backlash. It was a bridge between them, where the unstoppable force met the immoveable object; an impossible, powerful, unfathomable place, like the eye of a storm. The spark of a plasma reactor. The singular moment when a star went super nova; they met in the place where perfect discord met harmony.
Jazz picked up on that particular thought, chuckling softly at it.
"Where you and Ah collide," he murmured. "Ah like it."
Of course you do, Prowl thought, knowing full well that his partner could hear him.
Jazz watched him with a sad smile, something like regret floating around his features. He reached out, running the tips of his fingers from Prowl's shoulder, down his side, ending at his hip. Where he touched, there was a magnetic pulse to sooth the tension, a lacklustre gesture. His hand dropped between them like a dead weight.
"Ya ready?"
A tentative nod was given.
After that, no warning was given. No countdown, no time to brace himself. Jazz's mind reached in and flicked the switch as easily as some might turn on a light. There was emptiness on the other side of them dam, just a yawning blackness as tension mounted. Sensation teetered at the precipice; emotion was there, so suddenly surprised by its freedom that it did not move right away into an avalanche.
For a single, fleeting moment, Prowl opened his optics to see Jazz and felt the deepest gratitude for the one creature in all the wretched universe who was brave enough, and stupid enough, to do this for him. Prowl could live for as many lifetimes as Jazz and still never encounter someone quite like the saboteur. His one good arm curved around silver shoulders in silent solidarity, drawing their frames close until their personal fields mingled. Prowl's forehead pressed against Jazz's.
And then everything came rushing at him at once.
There came a sudden whooshing in his audios like he were plummeting in free fall, but the ephemeral wind that whipped through his frame did not bring with it the balm of a cold touch. Instead, it was hot. Burning. It was fire and acid, a sandblaster of superheated plasma blasting through his frame with wanton abandon. The physical manifestation of so many unfelt emotions hitting him at once, each one bleeding into the other, screaming to be heard, clawing at him from the inside to be acknowledged.
Regret. Shame. Disgust. Helplessness. Irritation.
Fear. Horror. Frustration. Despair. Shock.
Rage. Fury. Bitterness. Impotence. Powerlessness.
Hate.
Self-hate.
Hate. Hate. Hate.
Always the strongest to be felt, hate choked him. Swallowed him whole. It was always there, festering, given reason to exist through every failure ever conceived. The blackness of it touched him deep, hooked onto his softest parts, and spread like the disease it was. His constant companion and personal poison.
If not for his muted vocal processor, the entire outpost would have shook with the force of his scream. As it was, only stormy static spewed from his mouthplates, shortly followed by the wet contents of his tanks. He did not even possess the sense of mind to turn his head, having the energon spill out across the covers and coat the set of silver armour anchoring him to the berth. Though is lower half was paralysed, his spine bent at such a violent angle that his upper half twisted until the points of his chevron scratched paint from the backs of his legs.
He force of the convulsions might have been enough to snap him in half, if not for the strong arms that locked tight around him. The distant burn of clawless fingers digging madly into the flailing of armour in a desperate attempt to get him under control before he hurt himself. In a strange part of his mind, Prowl suddenly knew why Jazz had ground down his claws to nothing rather than shape them back into small points to let them grow back; he had wanted to make sure he didn't hurt Prowl, not even accidentally.
Maybe there was shouting in the distance, coming from upstairs? Out in the hall? It was echoing, but familiar. His audios were not working properly, except to pick up the sudden roar of his energon rushing in all directions. He was suddenly boiling from the inside out, pressure gauges going wild. Gases released into pressurized systems until nearly all of his frame was heaving, bloating, convulsing with wild swings. And still, through the bellowing roar of white noise, there was a shouting voice that faded in and out as if it were a poorly tuned station.
"Damn ya, Prowl! Just hold on!"
Prowl realized it was all inside his head. There was no noise within the generator room except for the loud hum of the generators and the thrashing creaking of frames that bucked and clung to one another. It was Jazz's voice inside his head, clinging to him with mental claws, shouting words over and over in hopes to be heard over the never-ending eruption. Hoping for them both in a way that Jazz likely had never bothered to hope in a long time... if ever.
From within his chassis, a fire had been lit with the fury of the backlash. His spark contracted in the grips of a vice, squeezing tight under a white-hot pressure. Like the gravitational grips of a white-dwarf, squeezing the blazing glory of a star smaller and smaller until there was no living force in the universe that could get close without being crushed to death from the pull. It felt as if Prowl himself were collapsing in on himself, his frame crushing smaller and smaller into the black hole of a thousand horrible black suns that had opened up in his sparkcase.
To his audios, it sounded like the great crack of a solid dam giving way under immense pressure. A terrible, sudden sound like the crack of lightning or the blast of a gun next to an audio. It was deep and loud, easily felt as much as it was heard. The failure of steel and re-enforcements, bulkheads and bolts. A lifetime worth of a dam built up, now crumbling with savage force. Gaping holes opened up; jagged cracks as raw as screaming wounds, opened to the free air. A lifetime of things held back for fear of them, disgust for them, no time for them, and here they were with no reins to hold them back.
True to Grimm's warning, Prowl burst.
A single shining singularity amongst the whirling darkness.
Though his vocal processor was mute, he still found a way to scream.
Jazz's faceplate was a myriad of movement, never once settling for long on a single expression. How could he? With the world's biggest headache filtering through his processor, he could barely remember what his own designation was. An avalanche of data was bursting through the buffer at a speed that rivalled light, threatening to collapse the forged mental bridge between them. Jazz gritted the hinges of his jaw and braced himself against the storm, digging in with everything he had just so he wasn't thrown out. If he let go now, he fear what might become of Prowl's mind.
There was so much sensory information for it to be nearly impossible to process it all. Too much for one mech, nearly too much for two. It was not just the cacophony of emotions that clashed and screamed, but the fabric of memory and experience. Jazz saw the world through Prowl's optics for brief, dizzying flashes. The sharpness of the angles and lines around him, the finality of every observation. A world of logical structure and order; a black and white cut, no room for grey. And Jazz saw faceplates of the past, some he knew and others he did not. He heard the echoes of voices ringing inside his head.
Jazz did not attempt to cling to anything. Not the memories or the faceplates or the voices. If he latched on, they were powerful enough to drag him away and he might not be able to find his way back to his own mind. He let it all blow past him, using his presence, his mind, as a twisting, turning filter through which the force of the gale would be absorbed and lessened. He did not have the power to stop it, which is why he did not even try. All he could do was let it pass him by and hope that he was enough to be what Prowl needed at the moment.
A surprised shout came from his mouthplates as a sudden vice locked around his neck. He heard the bursting of bolts from the armour inside his head. The grip was powerful, choking, but the hand was shaking uncontrollably. Prowl's hand, clinging to him, trying to find a solid anchor when everything else was thrown into the storm. Jazz let himself be choked, let himself be the odd anchor in the festering storm, because that it was he had promised to do. One of his hands pressed to the centre of Prowl's back, between the doorwings, gripping beneath the armour. The other moved restlessly down the back of Prowl's head, up and down, up and down, steady despite the epileptic fits the tacticians was suffering.
Prowl did feel that calming touch, but could not recall if it was the memory of a touch or the thought of being touched like that in the future. To him, the present had become hazy and out of sync. His chronometer, if he bothered to check it, would have been flashing him error signs rather than the time. In fact, many of his systems would have been doing the same. His vision swam like the tides upon a shore, ebbing in and out of focus. The motion made his tanks roil once more, spilling over the rest of their contents to the lukewarm air of the generator room. He heard the sound of liquid splashing against a solid surface.
A persistent rattling filled the room, which Prowl quickly learned was himself. He was shaking, unable to bring himself to stop. Everything inside his frame ached, so much so that he suspected even the air inside him felt sore. Frame parts had loosened from his seizures. Vents heaving, wet sounds gurgling from within from energon lines that had burst from the pressure. Memories, thoughts, and emotions ran amok in his cranium like escaped convicts, rioting through data streams and setting fire to everything they touched.
Despite the anarchy that raged, he was aware of himself once again.
It felt like an eon had been taken from him.
Or a weight had been lifted.
Still, within him ran black torrents that ravaged through his psyche, threatening to pull him into the undercurrent if he did not tread hard enough. The affects of the backlash would continue for several orns to come. Prowl knew he would need to be on guard, careful with himself lest he be dragged under and too weak to pull himself back. Yet his head stayed above the undertow, clear enough to recall his designation and what he was doing on the floor. Lucidity returned in a great enough amount to recall that he had a certain bot to thank.
Jazz rightly sensed the shift in Prowl's demeanour, taking it as his cue to finally release him.
"That wasn't so bad," he coughed hoarsely, sounding as if he had run his vocal processor through a gravel pit. "Ah've had worse."
It is the worst that I have ever felt it, but it did not last as long as I thought it would, Prowl admitted through their continued connection. Without even needing to do a self-diagnostic, he knew his vocal processor would need the night before it could be turned back on. I would not have been able to do that without you.
"Ah was just the buffer. Ya did all the hard work yourself," Jazz assured roughly. He grunted when he managed to disconnect his arms from around Prowl's frame, having nearly fused together after holding on so tightly.
Prowl laid unmoving upon the covers, staring at his partner as if seeing him for the first time. I have been terrible to bots.
"They'll get over it."
I am in your debt, Jazz.
White optics rolled in their sockets. "It's what Ah do. Ah save your aft, and some orn you'll save mine."
Thank you.
"Don't mention it," Jazz replied a little too quickly, sitting up to gather the soiled covers from beneath him and toss them away. "You're probably exhausted. Get some recharge." He reached for his cable to disconnect.
Don't, Prowl murmured, staying Jazz's hand mid-air.
Questions shone in the saboteur unsure gaze, though no sound came from his mouthplates or his mind.
Prowl fell back weakly to the berth, staring at the ceiling so that he did not have to see that faceplate. I am worried what might happen if I let my guard down while recharging.
"Ya want meh ta keep buffering?"
Just until morning, Prowl sighed. Please. I know it is a lot to ask-
"It's not." Jazz settled back down on the berth, also turning to stare at the ceiling. He was clearly in discomfort, even while he said, "It ain't so bad. It doesn't hurt so much, once ya get used ta it."
Prowl preferred to work late at night, when the Tactical Officer's workspace was mostly empty. Tacticians were the few officers who were not required to have bots on duty for the orn and night. The later the time of the night, the emptier their workspace tended to be; it was quiet, devoid of distraction, and Prowl found that these were the best conditions to get work done.
At the far end of the room, the door was kicked open and a small, storm-grey figure whirled in amidst laughter and colour.
"Come back, Evasia! Don't bother him! You know Prowl doesn't like it when we bother him!" other officers call from the hall, beckoning to her even as the femme ignored them. When their many entreaties to her failed, they sighed and closed the door. Best leave her to her own devices and let her get herself in and out of trouble with her cohort.
Prowl attempted to ignore the dervish, only to fail when it drew closer and threw a burst of confetti into the air.
"Oh Prowl, you should have come with us!" Evasia exclaimed, jumping into the confetti to blow it around and swirl her arms through the storm of colour. "The stunt troupe was amazing! The way they moved and all the tricks they did! It defied all the Laws of Physics, I swear! You might have enjoyed yourself, trying to use logic to figure everything out!"
"I do not experience joy," Prowl replied, brushing away the confetti on his desk before returning to his work. It was not necessarily his work, but he had happened to read one of Smokescreen's reports and did not like it, so he was rewriting it. Ever since Smokescreen had decided to embrace the realm of emotions, he was getting too emotive in his reports. Too sloppy.
"I don't see why not! Joy is wonderful! And so is awe and excitement and laughter!" She threw her arms wide, displaying the temporary paint she donned over her regulation Security Response decals. Decorations for her night out in the city, bright smears of pink and yellow and blue and green. She was best complimented by the greens, which matched her chevron. Her laughter echoed pleasantly off the walls, as did the sound of her tapping feet as she danced and wriggled.
"Emotions are a waste of time," Prowl explained. "They make us lose our objectivity. Our efficiency as Security Response officers drops. Power hierarchies become replaced with social hierarchies. Logic is replaced with madness, irrationality, and absurdity – the very things that we work to prevent in this city. Order will disintegrate into anarchy, and it will be the end of our society as we know it."
Evasia stood stunned for a moment before regaining her wits. "That was amazing, Prowl."
"It is a distinct possibility for our future."
A colourful hip leaned into the desk, flaking off bits of paint. "One of many possibilities, Prowl. The majority of Cybertron's citizens have basic functioning emotions, and our world has not plunged into chaos yet."
"Yet." He flicked the bits of paint away before they smeared into the finish of his desk. "There remains a statistical probability of such a future happening."
The femme shook her head. "What am I going to do with you, Prowl? You have got to be the silliest bot I have ever met. If I did not know that you had no sense of humour, I would say you were among the funniest of all the officers here."
"If I had any emotions at all, I suspect that I would feel very irritated at the moment," Prowl said.
"At least that would be something!" Evasia laughed, once again whirling and twirling around. She had streamers attached to her arms and head, flapping in a breeze of her own making. Stickers with the Simfur stunt troupe's decals were plastered up and down her back and over her sleek doorwings. She called him silly, but she was the one who best resembled the remark.
Prowl could only stand to watch her for an astrosecond before dismissing her. "What will it take to make you go away, Evasia? I am trying to work."
She skidded to a halt, her mouthplates pursing. "You are always working, Prowl. That is all you have in life. Work. Work. Work. While Kingpin, Hunter, Smokescreen and I are out there enjoying our lives, you are stuck here! There are so many things in life you are missing out on because you refuse to try something new!"
"My life is adequate as it is. I need nothing more."
"You only think that because you don't know any better." She touched his cheek, leaving behind a smear of paint that had yet to dry. "Haven't you ever been curious? Is there not a part of your mind that tells you that you would better be able to understand and relate to your fellow Cybertronians if you could feel as they feel? How can we be of one programming, and yet be so terribly different?"
Prowl pinched her fingers between his own to politely guide her touch away from his faceplate. "I have considered what it would be like to experience emotion. I have been curious of what humour is. There are occasions when I wonder what makes bots laugh. What makes them cry. What makes them love. But it is all insignificant, Evasia. There are far more important things in the world than indulging in useless agendas."
Light glittered on the diamond of Evasia's optical lenses, setting her warm blue gaze to sparkle. Her fingers wrapped tight around the hand that held her. "There is nothing useless about love, Prowl."
Prowl frowned, releasing her. "I will ask this again, Evasia: what will it take to make you go away?"
She leaned back, her expression turning shrewd. For all the emotion she had learnt since coming online, she was still gifted with the same core programming as any tactical officer in the Security Response. She could be as cold and calculating as the best of them.
"A smile," she suddenly bid.
"A smile?" Prowl parroted carefully.
Evasia leaned into the desk, looming over Prowl with a smile of her own. This close, he could see that she was inebriated. The smell of high-grade clung to her as a fine veil. She had imbibed throughout the evening, but only enough to make her tipsy. The majority of her faculties were still obviously with her, just a little looser than normal.
"Just one little smile," she coaxed, "so I can finally see what you look like when you smile."
"I would look exactly the same as I do now."
"You never know until you try," she needled, leaning so close that their olfactory sensors almost touched. "I will make it my goal in life to make you smile if you do not do it right now for me."
Reasonably speaking, a smile was not a gateway gesture into emotions. One could, in theory, smile without feeling a thing. It was a mere curving of the mouthplates, after all. A movement which required very little effort or thought. Though it was a foreign gesture, Prowl bid his mouthplates to move. He was surprised the hinges in his faceplate did not creak from disuse. It took some effort to force the metal plates into the proper position, tacked to stay that way through sheer force of will.
The end result was a smile that was forced and fake, brittle and devoid of any warmth.
"Oh," Evasia breathed, clearly disappointed. Prowl had been right; he looked no different now than he did before. She reached out to touch the smile, only to have her hand intercepted by a larger one. Prowl tugged her away, miscalculating her balance with the strength of his pull, accidentally pulling her feet out from under her.
She gasped, and then squealed when the floor rushed up to meet her.
Given that his sober reflexes were much sharper than her inebriated ones, Prowl yanked the femme back up by her arm to spare her the indignity of smashing into the floor. Yet another unfortunate miscalculation. Suddenly she was splayed uncomfortably across his lap. Her arm was bent to the side where Prowl still had her hand caught in his grasp, while her chest arched up with an awkward curve to meet his. Their olfactory sensors were nearly touching again. One of her legs was braced by the knee against his chair, between his own legs, and her other leg had somehow hitched over the armrest.
For longer than either of them deemed necessary, they could not move except to blink dazedly in between staring. Prowl could not understand how things had gone so wrong. He could not figure out how she had landed so awkwardly in his lap. It was improper of him to have handled her so roughly, so he opened his mouth to issue an apology in case he hurt her, but stopped when Evasia spoke first.
"Well," she breathed. "You certainly know how to sweep a femme off her feet."
Perhaps it was because the statement was so literally true that Prowl understood a joke for the first time, or that the joke was so absurdly true that it caused a glitch in his processor, but suddenly there was a glimmer of warmth inside him that he had not felt before. It was there, in his chassis, around the place where his spark generally sat. He felt a change, a brief one, and for the first time he saw a shade of grey in his black and white world. Storm-grey, and she was covered in paint and sprawled across his lap.
The stiff smile on his faceplate took on new qualities. It relaxed around the edges, warmed in the lines of his normally impartial faceplate, and looked wholly sincere as he stared down at the femme who continued to sprawl across him with wanton illogicality. And there, from his vents, huffed a soft sound that was not quite a laugh... but it was a start.
Evasia's face lit up like the glory of the sun had touched her. Both hands came to frame Prowl's faceplate, holding him captive as she looked her fill of his transformation. There was nothing unique about his design; he was one bot among dozens who shared the exact same frame with the extra same dimensions and details. But that smile! Oh, that smile! It was as unique as the spark that he hid so well. He was more handsome for the rarity of such a smile!
"I feel as if I have waited forever to see a smile like that."
The smile disappeared as quickly as it came. Prowl's usual impassive expression returned, almost to shield him from the newness of his smile.
Evasia continued to grin beatifically. "That wasn't so bad, was it? I bet it barely hurt."
"There was discomfort," Prowl admitted, helping Evasia to her feet when he decided her time on his lap was done.
She did not go far from him. Instead, she pressed her forehead to his, a gesture of affection she had never offered him before. Her touch was gentle as she pet him as if to sooth an ache he did not know he had. Her voice was soft and sweet as she whispered delightedly in his audio.
"It's okay, you know? To feel. It doesn't hurt so much, once you get used to it."