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silberstreif) wrote2012-09-09 03:51 am
Lies and murders 4
Written for:
prowlxjazz the anniversary challenge 2012Prompt: Doppelganger
Beta: Starfire201 and
taralynden (Two heroes who betaed everything despite headaches, storms and lack of time!)The next orn things didn't get better. Prowl had forced himself to look up the news channel in the hope that Magnus had exaggerated the situation, but it was to no avail. Every broadcast, every report, every transmission was full with rumours and other new information about Jazz or Prowl. Somehow a video of the moment in the Enforcer headquarters, when he had hugged Jazz, had made it into the news channel and was now being discussed by thousands of Cybertronians. Autobots he hadn't met in vorns gave interviews, time lines were created to speculate where and how they had met, their biggest missions were examined and judged. Even a few interviews with Decepticons had appeared, who described them in the worst way possible. In contrast, there were the few bots who claimed to have been saved, helped, protected by them.
He checked the channel of betting pool statistics, a favourite past-time of his, only to discover that the top ten bets were all about the murder case.
But the worst moment of the orn had been the discovery that in front of the Autobot headquarters was a mob, consisting of reporters and citizens demanding justice, waiting for him. Fortunately, the building had more than one secret exit and he used it to disappear quietly home.
At home, he requested another visit with Jazz. It was granted in less than ten breems later for the next orn. The small joy he felt at that was enough to fall into recharge at least for a little while. Before processor glitches of grey corpses woke him again.
And so it came that Prowl was using over half of his recharge cycles to create energon goodies in his, previously often ignored, kitchen. It was kind of relaxing, especially when he thought about the smile Jazz would have when he brought him the goodies later. By the time he would normally have disconnected from his berth, he was cleaning the appliances.
It was then that the door rang. Warily he looked up, remembering only too well what had happened last time he had unexpected visitors. It wouldn't be Backbeat this time and he felt a stab of sadness at that thought, than he straightened and went to open it, expecting the worst.
But to his surprise, it wasn't Turnout or a group of Enforcers who wanted to arrest him. Instead an average built green-black mech was standing in front of him. He blinked. “Excuse me, who are you?”
“Oh,” the mech looked at the floor. “Blip, my name is Blip. I'm the sparkmate of Tumbler and I wanted to talk to you, if it's okay?”
Prowl hesitated, but then opened the door further. “Sure. Come in.” After all, it wasn't right to leave a grieving bot at his door. “You're the witness, right?” he asked suddenly.
“Yes.” The mech stepped inside and walked to the couch but didn't sit down. “I've heard that our... testimonies are now standing against each other.”
“Correct.” And Prowl knew which was the lie without a doubt. For the first time he felt true guilt. While his alibi had protected Jazz, it was robbing this mech of his closure and the certainty to see the murderer punished. “Can I get you something?”
“Oh no, thank you.” The mech looked around. “It smells sweet...”
“Energon goodies, I made them this morning,” explained Prowl and checked his own chronometer. Time was slipping past and he didn't want to miss one astrosecond of his visit with Jazz. “Blip, why did you come? And how did you find out my address?”
“The address?” Blip smiled. “Oh, that was easy. After Tumbler's deactivation I was really often in the headquarters, you see? So, when I heard that they wanted to question the bot who gave Jazz an alibi, I followed them.”
Prowl frowned. “You followed Backbeat and Turnout? Quite a feat to shadow Enforcers.”
“Not really.” Blip smiled broader. “Not for me. After Hosepipe I really thought that they would finally see the truth. That they had to do something now. I was so hopeful and didn't want to miss one klick of it!” Suddenly the smile vanished and Blip growled, “But I was wrong! Instead they simply listened to your lies again. I spoke with Turnout afterwards, you know, and he said that he believed that you lied. But Backbeat? That fool didn't want to hear anything bad about you, he wanted to wait and investigate.” The mech sobbed. It was disconcerting to see the him abruptly changing between such strong emotions. “But I saw him! I saw how he killed Tumbler without mercy, I saw him!”
While Blip had spoken, Prowl had started slowly backing away, trying to get nearer to the door. Something about this mech wasn't right and set his antennae quivering. And what he said, Blip made two fast steps to the side and blocked the path.
“Oh no, no running away for you, liar!” said Blip with madness in his optics. He took a small weapon out of his subspace – an energy dagger.
Prowl stared aghast at the dangerous weapon. “You,” said he slowly, disbelieving, while starting to uplink to the emergency line. “You killed Backbeat?”
“Yes,” was the uncaring answer. “He wasn't doing his job, he was protecting a murderer! He had become a murderer himself. Murderer of my beloved Tumbler...” Blip made a step forward, towards Prowl. “It was easy, too easy. Just a bit of screaming, a bit of turning and he believed everything. Just like he had believed you. Easy.”
“Turning?” asked Prowl and made the emergency call. He had to stay calm. He had to stall.
“Turning, twisting, changing...” And Blip's body started to move, until it broke down to many small pieces that crawled across his very protoform, their colour getting lighter and lighter. “Mechformer, some call me.” And suddenly it stopped and Jazz was standing in the room with Prowl. The sight of his own lover and knowing that he wasn't actually him hurt. “He looks good, doesn't he? Attractive. I quite like his form, it's only fitting that it too shall be the last thing you see...”
Prowl could feel the slow panic in his spark. “Hosepipe!” he tried to distract the insane mech. “Hosepipe, why him?”
Blip blinked, then simply answered “Why not him?” and attacked.
The speed, how he held the weapon, the sudden fluidity of his movements – this was no civilian. Prowl avoided the first lunge narrowly, the second as well, all too aware of the fact that this kind of dagger would slash through his armour as if it weren't there. He jumped back, thinking furiously. The Enforcers would probably take two breems to come here. Unarmed, in a close-quarters fight with an experienced and determined enemy, he feared that they would take too long.
“Why me, now Blip?” he tried his distraction method again. “Am I just random as well?”
“No.” The mech trembled. “Never. I believe in justice, but after seeing reality, after Tumbler...” His voice broke with static, so that his next words were barely understandable. “The Autobots will not judge him, not deactivate him as he deserves. But it doesn't matter now, right? Because I've lost my sparkmate and now I take his own sparkmate. It's equivalent!”
Prowl suddenly remembered all the news reports that had speculated about their relationship. This mech had believed them. “You're wrong,” he said.
“Am I? Really?” Blip seemed for a moment unsure, then the madness came back. He chuckled. “Tell me, do you deny that you love Jazz? That he loves you? Will you lie about that, too?”
And the denial was already in his mouth, before he swallowed it again. No. This mech didn't deserve another lie, especially not another one from Prowl. Instead he made a drastic decision and moved into a fighting position. The activation of his long dormant battle programs felt a bit like coming home and hugging a long forgotten part of himself. The time for lies was over. “No. I love him, just as you have loved Tumbler.” To finally say it out loud, to another mech, was the sweetest of thrills. “I'm sorry for your loss.”
“Sorry! What does that mean? They all say it, but it doesn't help, nothing helps...” Blip laughed, rattling with static as if he wanted to cry instead.
“But despite your sorrow, I will not die for your justice,” continued the tactician, ignoring Blip's breakdown. “So, if you feel you must do this, let's begin.”
Prowl could see the irony of the situation. Just as Tumbler and Jazz had fought fourteen orns ago, now their sparkmates were standing here, in another fight that only one would leave alive.
Blip screamed and ran straight to Prowl, who stepped aside. If he had a weapon on him, he would have a good chance; as it was he would have to be more creative. He took advantage of Blip's momentarily imbalance and kicked him in the shins. The mech staggered aside, but before Prowl could use the opening, he had caught himself and attacked again.
This wasn't a battle between two civilians, or even between a civilian and an Enforcer. It was no wonder Backbeat had lost. Blip, or whatever his real designation was, had had soldier training, including deadly battle programs that eliminated all considerations of mercy. Prowl dodged again, his doorwing barely flitting out of the way. The dagger hit his kitchen appliances, slashing through them as if they were soft protoform.
Prowl looked around his apartment for a weapon, for anything, but he found nothing. He had always kept it empty and for the first time he regretted the fact.
“Stay still!” screeched Blip. “Stay still and die!”
Not if Prowl could help it. He looked at the apartment door, but Blip was too good. He wouldn't be able to escape, and then there was the risk of endangering innocent mechs they might encounter. Escape was no option. He had to fight this out.
He focused on the mechformer in front of him again, trying to ignore who he looked like. The weapon was the difference between them. If he could only take the weapon, then he would win the fight. But there was a low chance of taking it, as every experienced fighter knew that keeping the weapon took precedence above everything else.
Blip had seen where is optics had turned and sang out: “No escape for you, no escape for the liar! You will -”
Prowl attacked. Ruthlessly, he smashed his fist into the shoulder joint and the attack was forceful enough to dent the armour open, and while Blip howled in pain, he dug his fingers in and ripped as many cables out as he could. The joint sparked, and he jumped back anxiously. While most mechs were very vulnerable to this kind of attack, there were always exceptions to the rules. And a mechformer might just be the exception to any rules.
For an astrosecond the arm was flopping uncontrollably around, but he kept the dagger clutched tightly in his hand. Blip smirked: "Nice try."
Something moved in the shoulder, opened the damage, put it together again, then Blip raised his arms into the attack position as if nothing had happened.
Prowl wanted to curse. Instead, his battle computer refined the data and gave him a new attack plan. He vented and waited this time for Blip's next move. He didn't need to wait long. Blip attacked, the dagger aiming at Prowl's spark. Again, the Praxian dodged, but not fast enough. The energy dagger scratched his arm, cutting a few energon lines and he hissed, but didn't stop. Stopping would get him killed. With a turn, he was behind Blip and took him into a choke hold until he couldn't move. Unflinchingly, he began to add pressure on the throat, hoping to stop the supply to the head. While that didn't kill any mech, it would make him blind and maybe deaf. Blip struggled, but Prowl didn't let him go. Then, he felt the mechformer vibrating in his arms, transforming, and spikes suddenly grew out of the armour. With a startled gasp, Prowl had to release him again.
He wasn't didn't get out of range fast enough. Blip turned around, swinging the energy dagger in a descending arc. All Prowl could do was protect his more vulnerable parts – which weren't his sensitive doorwings. He screamed in agonising pain as the dagger cut through and nearly half of the left wing fell to the floor, greying.
“You're a feisty one, aren't you?” joked Blip while observing the greying part with delight. “If you continue like that I'll have to cut you apart piece by piece, by piece...!”
Prowl retreated to the other side of the room, harshly venting while his battle programs desperately shut down the dozens of pain and damage protocols. He checked his chronometer. One breem had passed and he was nearly out of ideas, seriously damaged and losing energon through his wound far too fast.
On the other side of the room, Jazz smiled and for a moment it really looked so much like his lover that Prowl wanted to go towards him for comfort. With great effort, he got a hold of himself and gritted his denta. He would not be deactivated here for the sole reason of loving the armour of his assailant!
Blip cut apart the couch, which now stood between them, apart and sent the two halves to the wall with a kick. Prowl's optics became colder as he helplessly watched the mech destroying the few things he held dear. The mech, who had mimicked the frame of his own beloved. Prowl's hands formed a fist as anger rose in his spark and when Blip attacked again he didn't hold anything back this time.
The first swing he blocked at the wrist, then he hit the arm to the side and slipped beneath it until he was behind Blip. There, he hit the thin armour plate at the mech's throat, stunning the mechformer for a moment. He forced his hands between the back armour and the helmet ruthlessly and pulled – Blip screamed. Screamed in Jazz's voice.
For a moment, Prowl froze, then he pushed his emotional centre further into the background and ripped out more and more cables, wherever he saw them. Mechformer or not, no mech could recover indefinitely. Energon bled all over Prowl and Blip kept screaming, but the tactician didn't stop. The throat, the shoulders, the legs, he destroyed the cables, maiming the mech in one of the most savage ways possible.
When he was finished, he simply stared in dawning horror at the bleeding, whimpering, far too familiar creature in front of him, and choked. “Jazz...” he murmured, and felt his logic centre balancing on the edge of a crash. He had hurt not-Jazz. All the energon on his hands, arms, armour, spilling across the floor... Jazz's.
But then the damaged mech moved and laughed hysterically, and it sounded nothing like his lover any more. Blip, against all logic, slowly rose again on his legs, the dagger still in his hand.
“You're good, fitting for the mate of a monster...” He stepped forward, then another step and another, and with everyone he was getting faster again. The mechformer was recovering.
“No...” whispered Prowl.
“Yes!” laughed Blip and attacked.
But he was slower and weaker this time. Prowl deactivated his emotional centre, despite the possible bad consequences completely and fought with the merciless precision of a scalpel. He hit Blip's arm, pushed him back, but the mechformer came again and again as if pain and damage simply didn't matter, his madness was not letting him stop. Finally, Prowl managed to grip Blip's hand, and destroyed the cables in the wrist. The dagger fell – into Prowl's hand.
Energy daggers weren't a common weapon by far. They got their energy from the mech wielding it, who had to keep the supply steady through the worst of the battle. Even more difficult was, that while such a dagger could cut through anything, it had to have the right energy output to do so effectively. And lastly, going into a close-quarters fight was normally not adviseable in a war. In consequence, few besides Black Ops had ever learned and downloaded the right programs to wield this weapon. Prowl was one of the few.
Many had underestimated the battle skills of tacticians in general and of Prowl in particular.. They called him a data-fighter, or office-hero. They thought tacticians were easy prey, forgetting that tacticians were the main target for assassins and as such forced to be very well versed in how to fight close range in small rooms. Next to Black Ops, it was Prowl’s tactical department which had the highest number of users for energy daggers. It helped, too, that Jazz had taken vorns of his time to personally teach Prowl how to defend himself.
And so Prowl turned the dagger with one swift hand movement, adjusted the energy output and stabbed it deeply into the very part of the chest were he had calculated was the highest chance for the spark to be – directly in the middle, the only place that would be covered by armour in any Cybertronian frame the mechformer might turn into.
Blip froze, and Jazz's blue visor stared up at Prowl and then slowly went white. The body crumbled to the ground, dead and greying. But instead of any feeling of triumph, all Prowl could see was Jazz's body greying on the floor, with a fatal spark wound that he had just caused.
His emotional centre had reactivated itself with vengeance.
Prowl felt his hands tremble, than the dagger fell to the floor next to him. He sank to his knees, not daring to touch the frame, knowing it wasn't Jazz and yet... he felt himself crashing as emotional and logic centre conflicted over the very definition of reality. His world was breaking apart and bleeding into background noise. Suddenly he was so very, very tired...
“Sir?” said a voice. “Sir – oh, Primus! I need help here. Medics! Medics!”
Someone got down beside him. “Prowl, can you hear me? Why did you kill Jazz?”
He wanted to answer, but all he managed was a small burst of static.
“Get to the side, youngling. He's crashing! Put him into stasis fast, before his core lines can damage each other. Do it - Now!”
Everything went black.
~
Jazz had always liked it to watch Prowl recharge. In the beginning, in Tarn and after, it was the wonder of seeing him lying still and enjoying that peaceful expression on Prowl's face. In the war it had become an assurance that despite what he had become and did that there was still one mech who trusted him enough to recharge next to him without hesitation or doubt. Since the truce began, it was the comfort of having him near and to be able to simply enjoy it.
Right now, though, it was once again the sharp relief that he was all right, and they were together and safe. Something that he had hoped not to feel ever again, but had longed for in the lonely joors in the prison cell.
At first, they had brought Prowl into the hospital, where Ratchet had scared away all other medics to put Prowl into deeper stasis as a precaution. No one was sure what kind of damage the emotionally-charged experience of killing a friend and colleague (and sparkmate, but Jazz never confirmed those whispers) might have wrought on the battle computer, regardless of the fact that Prowl knew it wasn’t truly Jazz he had fought.
When Jazz was released from the prison with many apologies and even more bootlicking, the first stop he made was at the hospital to visit Prowl. He laid there, so quietly, so alone... Jazz never wanted to leave him again.
But the mess was huge, and there were still ties to be cut, and disinformation to be planted, before they could truly be declared innocent. And so he stood and left Prowl, and worked furiously to return as soon as possible.
An orn ago, the political fallout had happened, the news channel was still reviewing the victims and speculating about Prowl's state and Ratchet declared Prowl undamaged, but that he should wake soon from the stasis.
Jazz, taking one look at the white and impersonal hospital room with the many foreign bots running around outside, had nodded and requested that he be transferred discreetly to his own apartment. Only Prime and Prowl had known its location two deca-orns ago, but Prowl's was uninhabitable and he didn't want to many foreign bots around when he woke up. The security breach in having others learn where he lived was a cost he was willing to pay; he would move in a few deca-orns anyway, just in case an Enforcer or reporter had discovered too much.
For good measure he had taken every one of the few trinkets that Prowl thought valuable, cleaned the energon from them and placed them in his own apartment. Then, with nothing else to do anymore, he sat down next to the berth, took his hand and waited.
“Jazz?” whispered a quiet voice.
“Ah'm here.” Jazz smiled and for the first time in over sixteen orns entirely relaxed. Prowl was awake and they were both okay. “Everything is all right.”
“That's good to hear.” Prowl slowly sat up on the berth, without letting go of Jazz's hand. “I remember... Blip? Is he...”
He squeezed the hand. “Yes. Ya killed him.” For a moment there was a deep sadness on Prowl's face and Jazz wanted to kiss him for it. Despite the war, the tactician hadn't managed to become a cold-sparked killer. “Blip was a mechformer. Ah researched him, and after a bit, discovered a few other aliases of his. One of them he was known by was the designation Axer.”
“Axer?” Prowl got the far away look that meant he was searching his memory banks. “I've head that name before...”
“A Decepticon bounty hunter,” confirmed Jazz casually, as if he hadn't hunted down every scrap of information for Blip and Axer. “One of the few who had dealings with the Neutrals. But he vanished in the middle of the war and no one had seen plate or aft of him since then. Until now.”
“So, he was a Decepticon?”
Jazz sighed, and then shook his head. “No. Ah think he left the Decepticons because he didn't agree with them any more and took on a new identity, the one we know as Blip.”
It wasn't a rare thing that mechs abandoned their factions, but it rarely happened with as much skill as the mechformer had shown. Jazz wouldn't have made the connection between Blip and Axer without the analysis of his fighting style and skills, the knowledge that the mech could change his appearance at will and that some secret had to be in Blip's past.
“And then...?” asked Prowl.
“Lived since that moment as a normal Autobot citizen,” said Jazz. “The Enforcer believe that he slowly went mad under the pressure of his different identities and killed Tumbler in a lover's spat. Afterwards, he couldn't live with the guilt and his processor blamed the only bot he knew who could have done it as well: me. When Ah had an alibi, he deactivated Hosepipe in the same manner, probably to add the pressure on the Enforcers and because Hosepipe simply was at the wrong place for the wrong time. Backbeat, though, was a careful act of revenge, because Blip felt his testimony was being disregarded. In the end, he decided to attack ya because in his mind it was an act of justice that Ah lose ma sparkmate just like he did.”
The tactician was quiet for a moment, simply staring at the saboteur. Then he said: “But this is not what happened.”
“No,” admitted Jazz with regret. “It ain't.”
Prowl looked down, away from the saboteur and shuttered his optics. “You killed Tumbler, right?”
“Yes.”
Prowl shuddered, then he got himself under control. “I didn't ask that orn after the Tumbler's deactivation... but I ask now. I have to know for what reason I lied and pushed an grieving sparkmate, mechformer or not, into madness! For what reason did Hosepipe and Backbeat and even Blip had to die! Was it all worth it?”
Jazz let go of Prowl's hand, not daring to look at this sparkmate any more. “Ah don't know, Prowl,” he answered softly. What was worth a murder? A lie that prevented justice?
“Jazz... Tell me, please.”
“Ah...” He gulped and started again, trying to keep it voice calm and impersonal. “It started several deca-orns ago. As ya know, mechs were getting sick because of bad energon. It weren't many, but Ah thought it strange that there was rarely a source of the bad energon or of supid mechs who had diluted it. We investigated. Took probes of the energon storage tanks, asked discreetly around, the usual thing. Not usual was what we found. Of ten probes around three were always contaminated with a slow acting poison.”
“Poison?” repeated Prowl alarmed.
“Yes. It varied how much poison was in it, but the mechs that got sick had drunk the highest dose. Any higher, and it would have been deadly. We realised that someone was doing this not only deliberately, but was increasing the amount of poison slowly but steadily. At that point, Ah contemplated of alerting the Enforcers and Prime of our problem.”
“But you didn't.” As chief of security, Prowl would have been among the very first to be alerted to the problem.
“No, because Ah was afraid of a mass panic... There is enough poison dissolved in the energon that is still in storage tanks and hidden in the pipes and converters that we might take nearly a vorn to clean it all out. Tumbler was thorough.” Jazz's visor went a few shades darker. “Ah let Teletraan run simulations, Prowl. No one was dying yet, but if they all discovered that they were slowly being poisoned and nothing could prevent it? Mechs are still scared by the past energon famines and this fear makes them more irrational. Teletraan predicted riots, theft of clean energon and destruction of the storage facilities.”
“But without the energon storage facilities we wouldn't able to fuel the city at all. We would need at least a quarter vorn to replenish the energon stores to a level were no one was going empty,” said Prowl troubled, as he had written more most of Teletraan's simulation programs. “And even worse, a new energon famine would have weakened us enough that the Decepticon would certainly attack. Truce, or no truce.”
“Yes.” Jazz stood and started to walk around in the room. “Already, the poison was and still is weakening the poorest mechs with the lowest maintenance and the sparklings. Our only hope to prevent deaths was to find the culprit fast.”
“The culprit was Tumbler?” guessed Prowl.
“Yes. Every time he worked, he spread a bit of energon into the converters, the pipes, wherever he was...”
“Why?”
Jazz shrugged. “Ah think he was bored.”
“Bored?!” Prowl looked at him with incomprehension. “He poisoned a whole city because he was bored?”
“Maybe.” Jazz sighed, he didn't like not having all information. “Or his sparkmate had still a few connections to the Cons and they did it for them... Ah don't know. Ah couldn't find any message or hint that pointed towards Megatron and his gang.” He stopped his walk and took one of Prowl's little trinkets, a wonderful green crystal from Praxus, into his hands. It calmed him. “Anyway, we discovered him and thought about what to do... arresting would mean informing the Enforcers, which would put it all into the reports. It would have leaked sooner or later, just like the video with us hugging in the waiting room leaked, together with the fact that all energon will stay contaminated for some time.”
“So no arrests.”
“Right.” He turned the crystal in his hand, nervously, expecting Prowl's condemnation of him with every word. “We warned Tumbler that this would have consequences, but the guy didn't stop.” Jazz sighed, full of grief. “Four orns after our warning, a sparkling got a high amount of poison and nearly died. It will probably have processor damage for the rest of its – probably short – life.”
“So, waiting wasn't an option as well.”
“Yeah... then we thought about kidnapping and hiding him away.” He looked at Prowl, who seemed deep in thought, nearly ignoring Jazz.
“That would have been too obvious,” answered Prowl, slowly seeing the whole damning picture. “Tumbler was a mech that would have been missed. He had a sparkmate and friends who would search for him. There was a risk of them or the Enforcers discovering the poison and then you would have had a mass panic again.”
Jazz nodded. “Not to mention the small fact, that kidnapping an ostensibly innocent citizen is illegal as well. What would Ah have done with him afterwards? Had he lived, he would have put me and ma whole department into the line of fire.”
“For abduction instead of murder,” said Prowl.
“Yeah.” It wouldn't have been much better than what had happened in the end. Prison, loss of job and reputation, maybe a memory wipe, it all would have still happened. “We took too long to think about it. Tumbler increased the poison, probably because he felt cornered, and eight more bots got sick. The youngest, barely older than four vorns died. Spark-failure.” Jazz looked down at the crystals, because for the next words he didn't want to see the Praxian's optics. “It was the last straw. Ah decided that the mech had to be eliminated and it had to be done fast. Ma guys destroyed all the poisons in his apartment, while Ah took on the deed.”
“You were sloppy.”
The saboteur winced. “Yes.”
“And so I had to lie and between the two of us Blip's sanity was destroyed.” Prowl sounded cold, accusing.
Jazz frowned, as his temper didn't want to accept this without trying to defend himself. “To be fair, mechformers ain't the sanest of mechs under the best circumstances.”
“Jazz!” growled Prowl and suddenly stood from the berth. “It doesn't matter. This all should have never happened. Why didn't you come to me with the problem? I'm sure together we would have found a better solution.”
“Probably.” The mech put the crystal back and turned towards Prowl. “But Ah was so sure that Ah had it all under control, that Tumbler was just a sick fragger that had to be stopped. Ah... really tried to avoid more deaths, Prowl. Ah thought that this way Tumbler would die tragically, but loved and as an upstanding citizen, instead of being executed by an Autobot court. But no one would search for poison, no mass panic and all would try to find a mysterious killer...”
Prowl walked towards him, slowly shaking his head. “All you described, happened, Jazz. Just with a few additions...”
“Ah know.” He managed a weak grin. “We had to improvise.”
“I hate improvisation,” said Prowl wearied and kissed Jazz. “But I suppose, it all could have been worse.” He looked the mech he loved into the visor. “Next time, try to keep us out of the line of fire, okay?”
Jazz smiled truthfully, with the kiss knowing that he had been forgiven. “If ya do the same, liar.”
“We'll see.”
That recharge cycle, they cuddled together on the berth. It was nice to just enjoy the feeling that all was well, and that the love of your life was with you. Despite everything. Prowl was slowly disconnecting with the reality and powering down, but Jazz... Jazz lay awake next to him and stared at the ceiling, thinking.
“Prowl?” he asked quietly, knowing that his sparkmate could still hear him. “Ya are aware that Ah had to give them evidence from the apartment for proof ya're innocent, right? They didn't find the listening devices, and I've destroyed them all by now, but... I had to give them a film of the fight.”
“I know.” If Prowl was surprised or angry that Jazz had even installed cameras in his former home, his sleepy voice didn't show it.
“Ah saw the fight,” Jazz said into the darkness and waited.
Prowl didn't answer.
“When ya shut down your emotional centre that ya think logically... The Enforcers believe that ya killed Blip in a classic piece of self-defence and yar crash only strengthened that perception. But Ah know yar fighting skills and with an energy dagger in the hand, a weakened mech in front of ya, ya had other options. And ya must have realised them.”
“Jazz...”
But the saboteur wasn't finished. “Ya killed Blip in a logical decision.” He hugged the Praxian, gripping the armour so tightly that it had to be painful. “Ya killed him, so that he would get the blame for Tumbler too, right? Ah've not only made ya into a liar, but a killer as well...”
“Jazz,” Prowl turned and kissed him. “Never doubt that I would protect any Autobot just like you do. You have turned me into nothing I haven't already been. And now recharge.”
The saboteur wanted to say another thing, but then closed his mouth and simply cuddled closer with a smile. Maybe, it really had all been said.
Epilogue