Chapter Text
Jazz crossed his arms across his chassis and made optic contact with Prowl, who stood across the large table that was centered in the meeting room of the Autobot’s High Command. Prowl returned his stare, blankly, the only show of emotion being an acknowledging doorwing flick. Mirage stood to Jazz’s right, slightly behind his commander, and was rigidly at attention. At the head of the table was, of course, Optimus Prime himself, in the metal — currently looking very conflicted with his furrowed expression. Other ranking officers flanked the table, but Mirage wasn’t too interested in them at the moment.
The tension in the room could be slit with a knife, but Mirage thought that Jazz speaking out did the job well enough.
”So.” All optics would have snapped to the Second in Command at that moment, if they weren’t already there. Jazz continued, “Prowler. My agent” — here he gestured to Mirage, who nodded politely — “tells me that we have an opportunity that could turn the tide, possibly win us the war, and you want to not take it?”
Jazz’s incredulous tone made Ironhide, who was sat next to Prowl wince. Prowl’s subtle body language was (while probably not visible to the average outside view) was a general mix of resigned, firm, and calculative, shown in the rigidity of his spinal strut and the line of his intake. Mirage had no doubt his mentor could pick up on it as well, of course being both Special Operations Commanded and Prowl’s lover. While the latter wasn’t up for debate, he certainly thought both bots had a strange way of showing it in public. But then again, neither were very forthcoming with information, despite Jazz’s friendly demeanor, so they may act completely differently behind closed doors.
Prowl replied with a fairly neutral tone, despite the aggressive words, “As I said, the risks here are unparalleled and I do not believe it to be a safe move. Would you risk losing the war now, when we’ve been fighting for millions of years? All because your agent had a soft spot for some ‘cons who may or not be getting mistreated?”
All around the two standing mechanisms quiet conversion and debate sparked. Mirage strained his audials to try to catch what he could from those closest to him while still paying attention to the officers in front of him.
Jazz shook his helm. “No, ya know I don’t want that, but there are ways to counter them. I believe in our cause’s ability to regulate these risks while still finding ways to benefit us. No mech can say what will happen, and this chance is not one I want us to pass up.”
Prowl prepare to argue back, but was cut off by the Prime raising his right hand.
”Hold on.”
Immediately the room fell silent.
Optimus continued, “We cannot have our command fall into a divide over this issue. I believe we are equals here, so it shall be put to vote. Some may wish to keep their vote anonymous, so please ping me an affirmative or negative confirming your stance on the topic at hand: should the Autobot faction dedicate resources to attempting to convince the Air Commander and Second in Command of the Decepticons, Starscream, as well as his subordinates which whom he has an unknown positive relation with?”
A low murmur moved like a wave through the assembled bots. Personally, Mirage liked the idea. Obviously he was in support of the topic, considering he was the one who had brought the idea to Jazz, although he was surprised at the ferocity Jazz displayed defending it. Though, come to think of it, wasn’t there a rumor spread that Jazz had ties to the Decepticons? Not that Mirage believes ill of his Commander and friend, or that he could be a double agent in the slightest. Most bots probably just dislike the way the spy seems to pop up whenever you least want him to, and silently to boot.
A few breems passed in silence as mechs deliberated their answer, and Mirage stilled the instinctive wish to fidget or use his outlier. Suddenly disappearing would probably not reinforce his mysterious personality front all that well. Instead, he decided to pass his time by trying to gauge the thought processes that were painted upon the faceplates of those around them without them knowing it. Man, having training was helpful sometimes.
Finally, the Prime gave the results, “It seems the decision was close, but we overall leaned against it, and the important factors most mentioned were unreliability from the Seekers as unknown variables, and our personal issue of mechpower. Ultimately, we will not dedicate resources to this project, but it was still very much appreciated for being brought up, and a valuable piece of intelligence. Thank you Jazz, Mirage.”
Jazz bowed stiffly and Mirage nodded slightly, following his commander out of the room. As soon as they ducked through the doorway, Jazz was gone. Most likely off to sulk or think, or whatever that mech does when he’s upset with Prowl. Like he said, strange relationship.
Mirage huffed. He knew what he saw — those Seekers were not the cold-lined killing machines that they’ve come to view them as over the course of the war. They obviously cared for each other (though in what capacity, Mirage was unsure. Vosnians were always a secretive bunch about their bonds and tradition and during wartime it was no different.) and were obviously being mistreated. A little push in the right direction might help them to make a choice.
Rejected Decepticons joining up with the Autobots would be pretty idealistic, but becoming neutrals also wasn’t out of the question. Though, there were very few left after the devastation that ravaged Cybertron — pressure to join either alignment increased drastically coupled with the multitudes of extinguished sparks.
Regardless of the obvious advantage it would lend, their Command voted on it and Mirage had to accept it no matter his own thoughts. Right?
“Starscream!”
Thundercracker somehow managed to slam the automatic doors to their habsuite closed behind him as he stormed into their shared space. Skywarp watched through the secondary doorway from his position lying on his back in their berth, chassis half dangling off the side, and pedes kicking.
Starscream turned around from where he was situated in a chair that he had modified to fit to their frametype, accommodating for the wings that few Cybertronians had. He raised an optical ridge at his obviously irritated (rare for Thundercracker) trinemate, and continued tinkering with the small device in his servos without looking down on it. Skywarp would almost be impressed, but after millennia of living with the other Seeker, it looses its touch after a while.
Thundercracker made his way over to their tricolored trineleader, and Skywarp dialed up his audial sensitivity to listen in. Though he was radiating anger on the outside, over the bond Skywarp -- and Starscream as well -- could both tell it was mostly exaggerated and not sincere.
"Yes?" Starscream prompted, facing Thundercracker, "What's this about?"
The blue Seeker twitched his wings and leveled his optics at Starscream. "You know what it's about."
"I have no idea what you're talking about." Starscream replied, and Skywarp could feel the playful smugness radiating off of him.
Thundercracker jabs a digit in his direction accusingly. "No, no, no! You've put me on monitor duty with Soundwave the last few cycles. You know he freaks me out!" A full frame shiver runs through his plating when he mentions the cassette carrier. Skywarp can relate!
Starscream shrugged nonchalantly. "You fit what I needed in that position. That's all. Don't spare too much processor power on it, you'll be assigned a different shift soon."
"No, I know someone was supposed to be there that wasn't me, and it was changed last minute. I bet I can find a capture of the original..." Thundercracker trails off in that distant way that reveals he's working through memory files or staring at his HUD. Uh oh.
A momentary pause, and --
"Skywarp!" Thundercracker whirls around and points to him. Well, it was nice while it lasted.
Butting back into the conversation, Starscream adds on, "Wouldn't you do the same for a piece of gossip about Prowl? We almost never hear about Autobot drama and I needed to know! There’s no way he’d go for someone like Jazz, that can’t be right…"
Skywarp snickers. "Sorry, TC, didn't mean to make you the target. I'm pretty sure I like Soundwave less than you. But I'll tell you for the cheap price of ‘you promise not to slag me’, deal?"
"What -- why would I care about Autobot drama?" Skywarp faintly hears Starscream mutter something that sounds like 'uncultured' before Thundercracker yelps out "No deal!" and leaps at him.
Skywarp gives a lazy half salute and warps out of reach, snickering when he watches Thundercracker spin around with narrowed optics, outstretched servos, and a grin.
"Catch me if you can!" he chirps back, and warps away again, the echoes of his trinemate's laughter at the ridiculousness of the situation ringing in his audials.
A few jumps later, Skywarp was safely out of reach. Where, you might ask? He wasn't exactly sure. You might think that after spending so much time on one ship, that The Victory would be known to him like the back of his wing, but nooo. Skywarp was still discovering new rooms every so often. Like the deserted storage room he was currently in!
Looking around, a few empty crates littered the mostly empty room. A few scraps and pieces also were scattered across the floor, and shadows crept out from the tall and bare walls that surrounded the minimalistic space. Creeeeepy. No mech had probably been in here for at least a decade, based on the dust layer spread across every upward facing plane.
Well, that was until Skywarp. Ha.
Stepping forward, he poked about at the more interesting looking things, but pretty much gave up on the boring room after nothing really piqued his attention. Oh well, guess it was time to warp back to their quarters and see if Thundercracker had cooled off yet. Monitor duty wasn’t that bad… it was really just Soundwave that made it worse.
The sound of something clattering to the floor had Skywarp whipping around to the direction where it came from and leveling his nullrays at a suspiciously highly stacked amount of crates. Prowling towards the area with a glare, he couldn’t see any intruders, and his wing sensors didn’t ping anything in proximity.
Something had to have made that noise. After spending a few more minutes checking around the general vicinity, Skywarp hissed out of frustration and kicked one of them. A surprisingly bright beam of light broke through from the area it was moved from, and he shielded one optic as he stared down the apparent hole in the wall.
”Huh,” he thought aloud, “that’s a bit of a security risk.”
Whatever or whoever was in here was now long gone, and Skywarp supposed he should report the risk to Soundwave. Ooh, he should definitely do that, maybe he could score a few extra rations from their limited supply to share with his tribe and bribe Thundercracker to forgive him. Yes, definitely!
Trilling happily, Skywarp warped back out of the storage room, and trotted up to where Soundwave was probably lounging around. Wait, no, wrong term, Soundwave would never lounge. ‘Sit rigidly’ was probably a better description. Seriously, did that mech ever sleep? Do anything besides hold his backstrut completely straight and praise Megatron? Prolly not.
“Guh.” Starscream slammed his helm down into the pile of datapads with an incoherent noise of struggle. “Megatron wants these plans completed for the raid within the next few cycles, but he just doesn’t understand that the whole thing is idiotic and there is absolutely no way we can pull off this mission feasibly without the risks outweighing the benefits or whatever. Basically, I make a doom-plan where most of us get hurt or else he slags me.”
Thundercracker patted a wing sympathetically as he stood over Starscream’s shoulder, listening to his trineleader complain. Hey, at least most of his playful anger was directed at Skywarp for bribing him and no longer at Starscream for accepting the bribe. Now he could get the validation he most certainly needed for his complains on his leader.
”At least you’re not planning another assasination attempt this time, right?” Thundercracker offered hopefully. “He’d be more likely to if you were.”
Starscream rolled his optics and huffed. “Of course I am. He’s not fit for leadership, and he’s absolutely scrap at pretty much everything. His time has long passed.”
Thundercracker sighed. “Of course you are. Please be careful this time, alright? The last time we had to patch you up because Megatron didn’t want you going to Hook we had to use up too much of the energon Skywarp needed because of his outlier and I had to barter with Swindle for more. Eugh. He wanted holocaptures of me — and you and ‘Warp, but I didn’t let him have those — for Primus knows what.”
”Thundercracker!” Starscream yelped. “You don’t know what those are for? Mecha are gonna self-service to that. You’re a catch, TC, but don’t let them have you. Idiots like… Thrust or Acid Storm don’t get to have you.”
”Ah — huh?” Thundercracker flushed. “But — why? What? Me? I mean I understand you and ‘Warp…” he mumbled.
Starscream shook his helm. “You haven’t noticed? They all want a piece of us, all three of us. Too bad, so sad. Can’t have us. You shouldn’t have given them those holos, though, they might get brave enough to start coming onto you, and you don’t want to be peeling me off of whatever sorry ‘Con tries to get into your panels and ends up making you uncomfortable. Pit, they should know better than to try with me around.”
”Well, it does feel nice to be wanted…” Thundercracker notes, “But you’re right. I can’t help it, I don’t want any of them, especially not to interface with. Aw, mech, you’re really making me regret selling those to Swindle now. Ewwwww.”
Starscream tuts. “It’ll teach you for next time. I’ll threaten him when I get time and I should be able to track down all the copies to get rid of them. Take it as my monitor-duty-apology.”
Wings visibly perking, Thundercracker seemed a lot happier. “Thank you, Star!”
Starscream waved him off, and went back to working on the raid plans. Distantly, he could hear Thundercracker flop onto their berth, taking the spot Skywarp previously occupied. Ugh, there was no way these would work. Maybe Soundwave would support him? The mech was totally Megatron’s pede-kisser or whatever but he wouldn’t knowingly let plans this bad go through. He hoped. Maybe another assassination attempt really would fix it — this one would work. For sure.