Once outside, Jazz demanded: "I know Prime kinda owes you for holding the sky and 'specially Priox as long as you did, Optronix, but you're really gonna explain this to him?"
"You told me yourself that Ratchet is no threat to you or anyone. If I can't trust your word on that, the rest is probably dust, too," his CO replied, mildly. Then turning to Ratchet: "I apologize for Jazz – he likes to hassle the new recruits, and I haven't been able to break him of the habit."
Ratchet stared up at him a moment, then his gaze flicked to Jazz, as he said, "Thank you, commander, though I'm not convinced you're the one who owes the apology."
"Put it down to me being a slagging glitch?" Jazz suggested helpfully.
"Not hardly," was Ratchet's flat, too-knowing response, before continuing in a less terse tone: "I have a report to write for the base commander's lieutenant. At least now I know what I'll be putting in it."
"Do you?" Optronix rumbled.
"Yes." Ratchet and caught Jazz's optics when the special ops tech glanced up. "If there are any further questions, you can ask them directly. Good morning."
So saying, he flashed Optronix the required salute, then turned and stalked stiffly off in the direction of the medical wing, leaving Optronix and Jazz to stare after him. Once he was certain the medic was out of range for easy eavesdropping, Jazz turned to his commander.
"All right, flush it – how'd he convince you to let him fake a medical visit and pull that stunt in the brig?" he demanded.
"He didn't. He wanted a word with you, and I wanted a report from you worth the brig time. It seemed like a fair trade," Optronix replied, and when Jazz gave a disbelieving squawk, asked: "Something the matter, Jazz?"
"You're telling me you let him play that cold? You didn't know what he was planning?"
"Well, I knew he wasn't going to shoot you," came the ever so innocent response, and Optronix chuckled when Jazz swore at him – not for long, and he made sure it ended in a laugh, because it simply couldn't end otherwise, but still…
"Funny," he mused, and shook his head, "how people think I'm the one who takes crazy risks."
His commander just beckoned him to join him as he began walking, and Jazz, after giving himself a final shake, fell in at his side.
"In all seriousness," Optronix said then, "I do trust your judgment. And when I called Ratchet in yesterday evening to get his account of what happened, and he requested permission to speak with you before your release, he didn't strike me as out for revenge of any sort. Clearly, though," he continued, "he felt that your encounter yesterday had left something unaddressed. So I let him play and made certain the guards did, too."
"Prime's gonna just love that!" the special ops 'bot declared, and couldn't help but chortle over it.
"As you said, he owes me for the orbitals and for our part in Praxus afterwards. Besides which, I doubt he has anyone else who deserves you, and I'm not letting you go," Optronix countered. Jazz just gave a soft, resonant hum, and his commander vented gently, before continuing more warningly, "Nevertheless, we both were fortunate that insight proved true in this instance. If it hadn't, you'd be in the infirmary, and I'd be looking at dismissal and reformatting."
"Don't think the Saanakaar orbital contingent would take too kindly to that," Jazz observed. "Been through too much with you to let that just blow through their vents!"
"That's as may be – if he had shot you, there'd be no arguing the point, and if I haven't gotten them disciplined enough to accept an obviously justified ruling, then I need to be dismissed," Optronix declared, with a dark little tonal flourish. "However, he didn't shoot you, as you'd predicted. I trust," he said, and pinned his subordinate with a look, "that that encounter gave you what you needed for Flicksaw?"
"Might just have," Jazz mused, then added: "Thanks for the assist."
"So you have made up your mind about him?"
"Ain't got no use in this war for 'bots who only got principles 'cause they don't got enough in 'em to be able to want to break 'em," he drawled, then flicked his lights and gave his commander a decisive nod. "He'll do."
"And when a firefight finds him?"
"That's always gonna be a gamble, sir – even with us non-medical types. But he stepped up for Skypax, and he seems reasonably ready to use what he's got beside the gun – smart enough to use the taser instead of tryin' to get in my sights for the futile martyrdom of it," Jazz reasoned, and gave his CO a bright-eyed look. "Don't think he'll be throwing himself into enemy fire as a first recourse! Plus, he got you on his side for this morning's little drama. Not bad, either, as an actor – maybe a little limited, but not bad, even if he's torqued in the head." Jazz paused a moment in his thespian meditation. "Reminds me of me!"
Optronix gave a sardonic whine of his engine. "You might consider leaving that last out of your report – in some quarters, that's not a glowing recommendation," he advised.
"So get him for our company, where it is one. We're down to three field techs and no surgeons after Priox orbital and Praxus – could use someone like him."
"You think so?"
"Hey, he's a fully qualified surgeon looking to go where he's needed, namely on combat drops, 'cause doin' no harm in the ERB when his patients are dyin' sixty klicks distant before he can get to 'em ain't good enough for the medical directives that make him a pacifist. 'Bot knows what he wants – ain't afraid to go for it either."
"And after this morning, you'd trust him to have your back?" his commander demanded pointedly.
"Not his job – we take him on, we gotta be clear about that. But we can deal, an' if we can deal, I'm betting so can he," he replied.
"I didn't ask for a non-sequitur, Jazz," his CO replied with deceptive mildness.
"Look, he stood up under threat of bein' fragged for inflicting a pacifist on the lot of us. He tasered the special ops tech holdin' him up to protect a comrade," Jazz argued urgently. "Not content with that, he later formed a gun on the same special ops 'bot in a detention ward, in full view of cameras, to answer a point of debate and he conspired with and failed to disclose to a senior officer to do it – that's good enough for me, and it ain't even been a full day since we got introduced. Whether he sticks to his directives or not, you seriously think he's gonna last in any other unit but ours?" he demanded.
"There is that," Optronix acknowledged, seeming to linger on the idea a moment. "Even if he gets off that probation roster, he'll still have to go through the IF-SSR upgrade, and that could take a year. We'll be back up to operational status as a company before then."
"Think he might surprise a lot of us. Flicksaw gave me his record – the whole thing. He's pretty quick to adapt an' you know, sometimes need don't wait for us to get everything together."
"I've seen the same record. He's got a lot more to adapt to than almost anyone else in our company, and even if he will not fight, he still will have more of our lives in his hands than anyone save the command element and the Decepticons. That would be a lot to risk by rushing him through that reconfiguration, and that leaves aside how configuration may affect conviction and sanity." Optronix flickered his lights, though, and gave Jazz a nod after a moment. "Still, I'll consider it – on one condition."
"What's that?"
"That you convince him that he wants the slot. You, personally – not a proxy."
Jazz blinked, gave a startled little chirrup. "Got a feeling, commander, that he'll answer me with 'no'."
"Then he's not for us unless Prime so decides," was the reply. And when he would've protested, his CO drew him to a halt, and said, "We're short on medics – everyone knows that. But there are some available, and I have two of them on a list already. I'll add him to it despite his commitments and the delay a reconfiguration will add to his joining us on the strength of your recommendation and this morning's performance. But if you want him on the top of that list, you need to get him to ask for it."
"But – "
"Jazz." That singular warning tone stopped him cold.
"Yes, sir?"
"There are quite a few 'bots who wonder why I tolerate you, given your behavior and your propensity for wreaking spectacular havoc on missions that leave you wanting a few body parts. Do you know why I do?"
"'Cause a junior station controller who gets himself in position to dictate terms to Prime on orbital defense is about as glitched as I am?" he hazarded, since truth occasionally worked well as a defense.
"Because you could do my job if you wanted it. You just don't want it, and I'm inclined to think that you'd be wasted in it, which is why," Optronix said, a little more severely, "I put up with you sabotaging your chances of promotion at strategic intervals."
"I don't need the rank to do what I do," the special ops tech defended himself.
"Not to infiltrate and undermine, no," Optronix replied, but gave him one of those looks that promised that this was not the last word on that subject. Then: "I've said I trust your judgment, and I do, but not without reservation. You were right about Ratchet holding to principle, but you got played by Flicksaw, and that gives me pause."
"How do you figure Flicksaw – ?" Jazz began, a little indignantly.
"You said it yourself, Jazz," his commander answered implacably. "He knew who he was asking for the favor. He knew you weren't bound by the limits his neuropsychs are, and that asking you instead of some other special ops 'bot meant he need not worry that he would ever be confronted with the necessity of your 'script'. Because if there's one thing you won't risk, Jazz, it's getting overruled in your area by someone like Flicksaw, so you kept the assignment in confidence to ensure he'd never throw the breakers. You made certain he'd never be forced to be more involved than he wanted to be. He was counting on that, and you didn't disappoint." Optronix gave a sequential flicker of lights – the luminous equivalent of a shrug. "I can't blame him entirely – he is a medic, and it's a clever resolution to that directive conflict war puts on them. You, however, can't afford to operate on that sort of split vision. You were lucky it was Flicksaw, and not one of your contacts in Polyhex."
Optronix let him dwell on that for a few moments, then continued, "I intend to have a word with the CMO today about going behind my back to manipulate one of my 'bots into a task that entailed actions that he wouldn't have authorized himself. I will also assure him that I have your word that you will henceforth avoid all such private favors."
Jazz vented gently, recognizing a prompt when it was fed to him. "Yes, sir – no private favors. You won't know me from a drone."
"I don't need a drone in this matter, I need you to conclude the op," Optronix countered. "If Ratchet is truly worth the risk of his medical commitments to take on for the rest of the company, then you'll convince him to put his name on that list and trust me this time to find a way to convince Prime to honor that request. Otherwise, we write this one down as a one-time favor to the CMO and you will abide by its terms and cease to pry into Ratchet's affairs. Do you understand your assignment, Jazz?"
With a cycle of vents, Jazz flashed a rueful, if wry, affirmative. "Think I do, sir," he replied softly.
Most commanders wouldn't have accepted that as an answer, but then again, as Jazz had happily discovered back when things had merely been going to scrap, Optronix was not most commanders. His CO just gave him a nod after a moment, and said, "Then you're free to go. I want your reports – all of them related to yesterday's incident and this morning's – in my message queue by noon."
"Yes, sir." Satisfied that they'd reached an understanding, Optronix left him then, heading in the direction of base command for what was undoubtedly going to be a most unpleasant interview with Sentinel Prime.
Which left him with a charge still to fulfill, for all he'd thought his task finished, save for the required write-ups. There were, Jazz reflected, as he made an about face and began the trek to the medical wing, some 'bots who wondered what under Cybertron's two moons kept someone as glitched and wayward as he was bound to Optronix as surely as a symbiont. There were many others who assumed it was just hard-wired survival coding – a sort of lopsided repayment to the only commander who would have him, let alone let him get away with some of his nonsense.
Personally, Jazz had a little more respect for those who wondered than for those who made crass assumptions about his motives – as if he'd been letting hard-wired coding run him since he'd left Kolkular all those many years ago! As if he'd been following automatic survival coding since he'd drifted Megatron's way back before anyone had been saying 'war', or for that matter, since they'd begun saying it. But a healthy incomprehension was in the end no closer to discovering the truth than the theories of those who thought they understood him, because the speculators were uniformly content not to test their speculation.
Had the partisans of either position actually bothered to ask him, they might have been surprised by his answer. It was a little-known art that his CO possessed, one that Jazz had never mastered himself, and so stood in need of the rare other who had, but Optronix had an unerring ability to remind even him, from time to time, that shame could unburden a 'bot of himself like nothing else could.
And who doesn't need that these days? he thought, and then put it all aside. For he had a mission to complete, and he'd be sorry for it to end in less success than its first act had...