Jazz wasn't exactly thrilled about his current situation with Prowl. But if the head tactician could listen to whatever Mirage told him then Jazz could too. His best friend hadn't steered him wrong yet so there was no point in ignoring him now. Besides Mirage was right. You couldn't force someone to be friend. And if Prowl didn't want to be his then Jazz had to respect that. In spite how much he craved the validation.
At least now that he wasn't spending his time trying to woo over the former enforcer Jazz actually had time to write out his long overdue reports on his aborted mission.
The seekers had been stockpiling energon which with their planet's low supply was all the range at the moment and The Tower's of Vos would give them a high vantage point to protect even if they were a bit of an obvious target. However Starscream had also ordered his minions to search for his families hidden rooms and the treasures within them. Which sure Starscream was a materialistic bitch but it wasn't as if anything outside of energon had any value these days. Jazz theorised that it was possible that they could've been searching for something of military value like any old golden aged weapons that used bullets instead of fuel but unfortunately his mission had been cut short before he could discover more.
Jazz had just finished converting his verbal report to written word when there was a knock at his door.
"It's open!" Jazz called out. A moment later he was pleasantly surprised to see the small yellow form of Bumblebee appear in the doorway, a beaming smile on his face and hands clasped behind his back. Jazz couldn't help but smile back. He hadn't seen the young bot as much as he'd liked since his promotion.
"I got you a present!" Bumblebee cried, skipping over to him.
"Mech it was your upgrade day! I should be the one getting you something!" Jazz faux scolded.
Grateful of the excuse for a break, Jazz put down his datapad and held out his now empty hand. He was expecting a drawing or a sculpture of welded scraps like Bumblebee used to make him when he was younger. Instead Bee placed a piece of perfectly intact pure white electo-base string.
"Wa...what?" Jazz stammered, nearly stunned speechless which for him was an achievement. "How did you even know mine was broken?" Jazz eventually asked, especially considering that he ensured that the events surrounding that did not get into the rumours mill.
Bumblebee pointed upwards where Jazz glanced up to see a vent above his head.
"You shouldn't be spying here. There's a lot of sensitive information that can't get leaked." Jazz said, scolding him for real this time. Even if he couldn't help but he impressed that the kid had managed it without him noticing, something else that was an achievement. "Where did you even get this?"
"I found it."
"Where?" Jazz asked, a sinking sensation in his stomach.
"Outside." Bumblebee replied his bright smile turning smug.
"Did you really think that going out of the Ark by yourself was a good idea?" Jazz asked.
"Well the twins did dare me."
"Oh so you knew it wasn't a good idea then." Jazz stated. His voice coming out harder than he'd intended. "Especially when Optimus forbade you to leave the Ark!"
"Yeah well now he basically banned me from joining the Autobots too." Bumblebee grumbled, crossing his arms with a pout before then throwing them up in the air. "This is so not fair! You get to leave the Ark on missions all the time!"
"Exactly! On missions! Where we have plans and rendezvous points so that we know where all of our troupes are supposed to be! What if you had died? None of us would have even known that you were out there! How would we have ever found your body? It would have killed Optimus! And then we would have lost this entire goddamm war!"
Jazz hadn't realised that he was looming over his desk, staring down with the same glare he used when interrogating prisoners until he saw the terrified glow of Bumblebee's wide blue optics .
"I-I.. I'm sorry!"
Jazz could hear in Bee's voice the genuine guilt -which good he had better feel guilty- but underneath there was also a tone of quiet resignation that he was going to be stuck on this base forever. Something that Jazz knew all too well when he was his age. Feeling trapped by the hand that life had dealt you.
Jazz unclenched his fist to look down at the piece of pristine white string in his hand that the kid had somehow managed to find in their apocalyptic wasteland of a planet.
Fuck.
"Go to your room!" Jazz shouted which urghh he hated the Feeling of those words coming out of his mouth. Jazz did not envy Optimus. This was why definitely preferred to be the fun uncle.
Bumblebee didn't waste any time scampering out of there. As soon as he was gone, Jazz stormed out of his room and along the command corridor until he reached the Prime's office. It didn't take him look to jimmy open the door. Optimus glanced up from behind his mountain of paperwork, not at all surprised that Jazz had managed to override his security codes.
Before Optimus could ask what he was doing here, Jazz slammed the string down on his desk.
"Where did you find this?" Optimus asked, picking up the string in confusion.
"I didn't. Bumblebee did."
Optimus nearly dropped it in shock.
"How?"
"By using the skills that we taught him to sneak past our security. Travels who knows how to the pit knows where! And get back inside without triggering any of our alarms!" Jazz told him.
Optimus simply stared at him as though he couldn't process what he was saying.
Jazz slammed his palms down on the desk, waking the Prime up from his stupor.
"Did you ban him from joining the army?"
"I didn't ban him." OP replied, his bright blue optics not quite meeting his own.
"Yeah sure." Jazz snorted. "Then what did you tell him that he's still not old enough?"
Optimus' flinch was all the answer he needed.
"He's not a sparkling. You can't use that excuse anymore. Besides we both knew that this day was going to come sooner rather than later."
"I know." Optimus sighed, seeming to finally accept what Jazz was telling him. "I just kept hoping that would be later."
"Well it's now." Jazz told him because as much as he didn't want to send the bot that he'd seen grow up into a war, Bumblebee had one of the kindest Sparks Jazz had ever known. Of course he was going to want to help.
"I'll think about it." Optimus promised reluctantly, because unlike some bots when the Prime said those words he actually meant them.
"Good," Jazz said, taking the string back. "Because I put the fear of Primus in him for now but eventually he's going to try to prove himself again and I don't doubt that it's going to escalate into doing something even more stupid."
"He never needed to prove anything to me." Optimus stated as Jazz turned to leave.
"Then why don't you tell him that."
Jazz caught the look of heartbroken introspection on the Prime's face as the door slammed shut behind him.
A/N: Taking a break from the Jazzprowl for some more Uncle jazz this chapter! Xxxxxxx
