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Prowl drank his energon.
Day after day after day.
He worked. Every few years, he changed jobs. Now that the war was over, mechs needed help in rebuilding their home, Cybertron. So Prowl worked, even if he couldn’t quite find the same satisfaction as he had during the war.
Day after day after day.
He heard what the other mechs called him. Had called him since he first onlined. No better than a drone. Sparkless computer. Emotionless calculator. Fragging cop bot. Waste of space. Ice-cold mech.
Day after day after day.
And one day, Prowl rebooted after a hard crash from too many hours of calculations and low fuel, and he wondered what was the point of it all.
He tried traveling for a while. To various alien planets, including Earth, to see if that kickstarted anything. But eventually, the cities all blended together and felt the same. Sure, the culture was slightly different, but every planet had a cafe. Had those stupid tower things to overlook their land and get semi-decent photos. Had people that were nice enough, but since he was only in the area for a few days, he would never see them again. Had pretty nature or historical museums or some sort of religious shrine.
But that still didn’t help. Prowl was an introvert by nature, so too much traveling wore down on him. Not enough, and he felt stuck. Whenever he returned back to work, he felt fine for a while, until the cloud in his processor slowly crept in again.
Day after day after day.
He tried therapy. Rung was the closest thing their planet had for a therapist, but after a few months he deemed Prowl good enough to stop going. Had told Prowl that everyone felt that way, that that was life. That he had to figure it out on his own. But Prowl still didn’t feel right. Didn’t see the point. Every day was just work work work eat eat eat recharge recharge recharge. Rinse and recycle. What was the point of Cybertronians living this long? He had accomplished everything he had ever wanted to accomplish in his lifetime, at least, what he wasn’t sure would give him rejection.
Day after day after day.
“Prowl, are you okay?”
Prowl didn’t look up from his work. He was in his office, a wall of monitors to his right. “Yes, I’m fine. You can leave your report there.”
A hand covered the datapad Prowl had been typing on. Prowl looked up and met optics with Jazz’s unreadable, blue visor.
Prowl frowned. Jazz wasn’t supposed to be here. Prowl’s current job was to manage the traffic flow of New Iacon, though really, he was just put on monitor duty to look for accidents. Not a lot of mechs liked having Prowl in high positions of power, anymore. Jazz worked as an event planner for New Iacon. There was always some festival or party going on around here.
“When’s the last time you took a break, my mech?” Jazz asked, his usual grin on his face.
Prowl flicked one of his doorwings. “About two Earth months ago, when I traveled to a nearby asteroid field. It was quite lovely, especially when a nearby sun lit it up from behind.”
Jazz laughed. “Naw, mech, I’m talkin’ a lunch break. Surely your job provides one of those?”
“Ah, yes. I prefer to work through my breaks.” Mechs always had their optics on him when he walked through the city. He used to enjoy them during the war, knowing that, despite their hatred, he was the one saving the Autobots daily. Now, he just wanted to go back to his apartment.
“Well, then I think your boss won’t mind us taking a real break right now. What do you say?”
Prowl knew this tactic. If he refused, Jazz would continue pestering him every hour until he conceded. Jazz had been the only thing closest to a friend back on Earth, but that was likely because of their close proximity as the top two commanders of the Autobots, underneath Optimus Prime.
When Jazz’s bottom lip jutted into a fake pout, Prowl sighed and said, “I suppose I can clock out early for the day. You don’t have work?”
“Nah, today’s my day off. Figured I’d catch up with an old pal, you know?”
An old pal. Hah. Jazz was probably checking in on the biggest war criminal on the Autobots’ side. But as part of the new treaty, all war crimes had been forgiven and forgotten. There were too few mechs left to put time and energy into that sort of thing.
“Sounds good. Do you have a place in mind?”
“Yes, actually. I’ve been doing some electro bass playing on the side at this really nice restaurant, so I can convince the owner to give us a good deal on the energon blends. It’s not too fancy, though, so we don’t need to buffer up before we go.”
“I see. I shall follow your lead then.”
The two of them left the building, transformed, and drove to the restaurant. Prowl no longer had his police decals on, now that he was back on Cybertron. Jazz had kept his Earth alt mode, liking the sporty, sleek look it gave him, most likely.
Jazz ordered their drinks for them as soon as they sat down in their booth. Prowl didn’t mind, since he would’ve gotten overwhelmed with the menu anyways.
A conveyer belt to their right delivered their drinks with a happy chime. To their left, there was a bar with a few mechs sitting in stools. An empty stage was in Prowl’s view, far behind Jazz, though Prowl could imagine Jazz playing up there with his bass. While the restaurant was mostly empty, save for the drinkers at the bar, it had a nice, modern feel.
Jazz took a long swig of his drink, while Prowl took a tentative sip of his. Very sour. Almost to his liking, it just needed a little more sweetness to it.
“You wanna try mine?” Jazz offered.
“No, but thank you,” Prowl said. He didn’t want Jazz’s perfectly good drink to go to waste.
Jazz nodded and leaned back in his seat, slouching. “So, my mech, what you been up to nowadays?”
“Besides the asteroid visit?”
Jazz laughed. “Right, right. Yeah, besides that.”
“Nothing much. Just working.”
“Any new hobbies?”
“No, no. You?”
“I’ve been thinking about going to the arcade they put on 12th street. I hear it’s got a real cool laser shooting range.” Jazz swirled a finger around the rim of his drink.
“I’m afraid you’ll be a much better marksman than me, so I will have to pass.”
“Oh, really?”
Prowl frowned. He lightly tapped the side of his drink, not liking that tone.
“‘Cause a little birdie told me that you bought yourself a real life laser gun.”
“Birds do not live on Cybertron, Jazz.”
“And that you added a silencer to it.”
“Well, yes, one can never be too careful on Cybertron. Especially post war.” Prowl had to concentrate on his doorwings, making sure they stayed stiff and upright like usual.
Jazz leaned forward, palming his drink entirely now. “But that wasn’t all they said you bought.”
“Oh? Who told you all this? Were they really a reliable source?”
Jazz tilted his head.
Prowl stared back, his face carefully neutral.
“Who you hunting, Prowl?”
“No one, I’m afraid. Just post war paranoia, I suppose.”
“Poisonous tablets aren’t usually a great self defense weapon. Trust me, I would know.”
Yes, the head spy of the Autobots would indeed know that. Prowl hummed. “Again, just post war paranoia. I was in an important position under the Autobots.”
“Then I’m sure you already know that stealing things from Ratchet the Hatchet would be a very bad idea.”
Prowl raised an eyebrow. “I wasn’t aware Ratchet had such poor security.”
“Nah, this was an inside job.”
“By who? Again, I’m curious who told you I bought these things.”
Jazz put a finger to his lips. “A good spy never spills his secrets.”
Then it had been Swindle after all. That idiot. He had promised these were coming from good sources. Prowl had been too blinded by the speed of the deal to notice. “Well, until you can prove that I purchased those things, I’m afraid you’re just working off baseless rumors.”
Jazz grinned, and Prowl knew he had made a mistake.
“Empty your subspace, Prowl,” Jazz said quietly.
Prowl scowled. “I don’t have to listen to you anymore.”
“It’d make me back off sooner, for one. Prove your innocence pretty quickly, for two.”
“Those aren’t two different reasons. They’re the same, just worded slightly differently.”
Jazz waved Prowl’s words away. “Come on, just empty your metaphorical pockets here.”
“No.”
Jazz leaned in close. “So you do have something to hide, after all?”
“No, I just don’t want to play your silly little games. I’m past all that. And besides…” Prowl downed the rest of his drink. “What are you going to do about it? Search me? You’re not a spy anymore. Nor a cop. You’ll be in violation of the law if you do.”
Jazz’s grin never wavered. He just kept staring at Prowl behind that stupid, blue visor of his. And Prowl could always tell where Jazz was looking, even with it on. He could calculate thousands of variables at once; predicting something like that would be sparkling’s play for him.
Prowl threw his glass at that visor right as Jazz lunged for him. The glass shattered on impact, though it didn’t break Jazz’s visor, the noise also shattering the comfortable atmosphere of the restaurant. Prowl rolled out of his seat and transformed, right then and there. He nearly crashed into the automatic front doors of the restaurant, which opened when movement was nearby. He could hear the owner screaming and yelling as he drove away, but Prowl didn’t care. He had a mech with a racing alt mode hot on his tail.
They ducked and wove and skidded between roads and tight corners. He had to transform a few times to avoid the lunch rush of workers trying to get back to work. Jazz tried to send Prowl a comm, but he ignored it. He was not going to be distracted by Jazz’s taunting today. Though, that was still a difficult feat, since Jazz’s music blasted everywhere he went.
Eventually, Prowl led Jazz to the highway, pretending he was going to get on, but he quickly swerved and ducked away from the on-ramp at the last second. A mech honked and yelled at him, but Prowl only chuckled. Good luck getting out of that one, Jazz, especially with the long line of mechs forcing him to continue onward.
Prowl kept checking his mirrors as he drove further and further out of the city. No sign of Jazz. No obnoxious music. No revving or idling or purring from his speedy engine. No ducking to hide behind buildings and pretending he wasn’t following Prowl. No. Prowl had truly lost him.
After driving for 30 Cybertronian minutes, he ended up at the edge of New Cybertron. Here, the landscape was constantly changing: metallic mountains rising up daily or falling down to become valleys filled with lush life. The city had stabilizers built into the city’s foundation, to prevent it from becoming overturned by these changing mountains.
In the distance, Cybertron’s two moons could be seen, despite it not being night yet. The sun was large and bright, so Prowl climbed one of the mountains that had a jagged and misshapen top. The top provided shade, and the mountain had a variety of ledges to choose from. Prowl went to one of the taller ledges, after calculating that the mountain wouldn’t change for a few Cybertronian hours at least, and sat down with his legs dangling.
He overlooked the gorgeous Cybertronian landscape. The metal shine of the land swirled from purple to brown to gold to silver quickly. There were even some alien life, it seemed, living down in one of the valleys. The aliens looked to be docile deer, similar to the animals back on Earth, though they had wings and long tails.
A small breeze picked up, and it smelled of iron and bronze.
Prowl felt his heart grow cold as he remembered why he was here. He reached into his subspace, pulling out the gun that he had indeed purchased from Swindle, along with poison tablets and a bottle of acid that could melt a Cybertronian in seconds. He set the poison tablets and bottle aside. Then he examined the gun.
During the war, he had fired countless shots from guns like these at his fellow Cybertronians. The gun was white, sleek, and lightweight. The laser “bullets” it used were charged from sunlight. The red light that shot from this gun had a similar reaction to the acid, though many considered it less painful.
Prowl turned off the gun’s safety. He pointed the gun under his chin, having researched exactly where to shoot.
His finger twitched on the trigger. Prowl clenched his teeth. And then he waited. For the sweet release.
And waited.
And waited.
And found tears falling onto his arm, causing his vision to blur. He let out a harsh sob, barely noticing when the gun was gently removed from his hand. A warmth enveloped him, and he leaned into it, unable to stop the horrible sounds that were escaping his mouth.
What a foolish coward he was. No one would notice his absence. He barely had any physical things in his apartment, so there wouldn’t be much clean up. He had written a will and placed it in his subspace, not that that really mattered, because he had left all his money to some local charity. He had no friends or family to give the money to; he had screwed over enough Cybertronians in his lifetime to make sure of that.
Everything was perfectly set up. Even this location had been part of the plan. Sure, the timeline had been pushed up, but at least out here, the animals could use his body for food and nutrients.
When he came to from all his sobbing and relenting, a song was playing softly and Jazz was humming along.
Prowl gently pushed Jazz away, trying and failing to wipe away the mess of energon fluids on his face. Jazz’s song clicked off.
“How did you find me?” Prowl asked. He couldn’t meet Jazz’s gaze.
Jazz switched positions: from crouching to sitting next to Prowl. He had a gentle hand on Prowl’s wrist. That was likely because Prowl’s legs were still dangling off the edge of the cliff.
“I’m a professional spy, remember? Or, I guess, an ex-professional. You were right in that I’m not a spy anymore. Just a party planner. But what good does that do me, when my friends need me?”
“We are not friends. You deserve better.”
“And I say we just got busy and need to spend more time together.”
Prowl chuckled. Then laughed. And then guffawed in an ugly, disgusting way. “You should have let me do it.” He tried tugging his wrist out of Jazz’s grip. Jazz remained firm.
“I actually did give you a chance, you know.”
That made Prowl finally look up at Jazz. Jazz wasn’t smiling. “What?”
“I only let you think you had lost me, back there. The truth is, I had put some tracking nanites in your drink. So I caught up to you pretty easily. You had plenty of time to pull the trigger; I could’ve stopped you at any time. But… That was your choice, you know? You had to decide on your own.”
Prowl looked down in his lap. He covered his optics with his arm, trying to will the self loathing away. His doorwings wouldn’t stop twitching. How embarrassing.
Jazz gently grabbed Prowl’s arm with his free hand and put it in Prowl’s lap. “Hey, no hiding anymore. Don’t you think you’ve done enough of that? I think you’re a very brave mech, Prowl.”
“Oh? A brave mech would take life by the wheel and do something about the monotony. But it feels like no matter what I do…” He swallowed back another outburst of tears. “It feels like it just doesn’t matter in the end. That I don’t matter. And why should I? I caused a lot of people harm in the past. And now, life is just an endless cycle of working until I deactivate. It’d be better if I was just gone, except I’m a fragging coward who just won’t die.”
Jazz was silent for a moment. When Prowl chanced a peek at him, he saw Jazz looking over their homeworld.
“You know, it’s thanks to you that we even get to see this view, you know?” Jazz whispered. “During the war, I used to dream of coming back to this planet, and then I’d wake up in those cold, lifeless bunkers on Earth and sob until my shift started.”
Prowl only watched him.
“I call you brave, Prowl, because you had to make some hard decisions during the war. And yeah, not all of them were good, but you weren’t the only one making mistakes. I made them. Optimus made them. But that’s the beauty of us finally making it back here. We get to start over, we get to become something new.”
Jazz twisted his grip on Prowl’s wrist, so that he was now holding Prowl’s hand. He continued, “And I know living is hard. The only way to help with that is to find people who love you, so it becomes meaningful again.”
“So what?” Prowl sneered. “You’ll just stick around because you feel bad for me? Surely you have better options.”
Jazz chuckled. “Well, sure, I’ve got friends, but none of them understood what the war was like for those leading it. To have a mission fail, upon your recommendation, and have to deal with the scrutiny and grief that comes with that.”
“You have Optimus. Ratchet.”
“Optimus is too busy being stuck in the honeymoon phase with Megatron, and Ratchet has Drift.”
Prowl blinked. He really studied Jazz this time. Saw the small shake in Jazz’s shoulders and the twitch in his jaw. Jazz… was really being vulnerable here. And not in the “spy trying to get information out of you” way.
Prowl looked down at their clasped hands. “I don’t know how to be happy. I’ll just make you miserable.” He had always liked how Jazz could light up a room, could make a group of people come together in a way no one else could quite manage. He had always watched from the shadows, when deep inside, he wanted to be the center of that attention.
“To be honest, mech, I don’t know either. Most of the time, I just feel like a clown performing for the crowd. I think…” Jazz scooted closer, until their shoulders touched. Prowl thought he was cheating. “I think we could figure it out, together? Build something one day at a time, and see where it goes, you know?”
Prowl smiled, which was barely perceptible. “I… I think I’d like that.”