Transfer Orders
Title: Transfer Orders
Author: AotA
Rating: K
Warnings: Prowl is acting kind of oddly
Characters: Smokescreen, Prowl, Jazz
Setting: AU bayverse, see notes
Summary: Empty seats seem to becoming a more common phenomenon all around base and it all started with Jazz.
Notes: Written for Prompt #1 “a room with an empty seat which should be occupied” November 6, 2010, off of tf_speedwriting . I took 61 minutes. Once again, this is Smokescreen out of my 100 drabble ‘verse, and the link to the listing is here. Please note that the links to each drabble are put into the list chronologically once they are written, even though they are written out of order and have some large time skips. The list is continuously updated.
Smokescreen frowned at the empty cell, and the seat which most definitely did not have a mech occupying it.
Looking left, looking right, then up to see if the mech in question was hiding on the ceiling and coming up with nothing, Smokescreen chirped an inquiry to Prowl.
“I am escorting him,” Prowl sent back.
Smokescreen was puzzled, normally, Prowl wasn’t the type to go out on a limb to do anything like take a prisoner out of his cell, no matter whether said prisoner was one who was merely a prisoner out of bad luck or not.
“Why?” Smokescreen asked.
“He was about to leave. I figured that it was prudent to circumvent his need to take such measures by allowing him out of his cell in a more proper manner.”
Smokescreen frowned, in a manner of speaking… that was indeed logical, but by another, it was the most illogical thing that he had ever heard Prowl say. The typical response to a suspected escape attempt was not to take the prisoner for a walk, but to tighten the holding measures. Still…
“Just make sure you don’t lose him,” Smokescreen told the other tactician. So long as it was Jazz, who was in fact not a criminal, and not one of those who were just waiting for deactivation, such unorthodox measures coming from Prowl were a good sign.
If Jazz went missing, whether when he was in a Praxus cell or not, it would reflect poorly upon the Praxus force, and, Smokescreen suspected, it would also reflect poorly upon Jazz as well.
Smokescreen was waiting for a response from Jazz handler before he could release the intelligence agent.
“Of course, sir,” Prowl acknowledged.
-=/\=-
Smokescreen came by Jazz’s cell once more, and was unsurprised to see that, once again, it was empty.
Smokescreen sighed and pinged Prowl once more, “Is Jazz with you?”
“Yes sir.”
“Tell him that I need to speak with him.”
“I will, sir.”
“Prowl?” Smokescreen sighed, “Please stop with the ‘sir’s.”
“Yes sir!” Prowl said, and Smokescreen heard the hint of cheekiness in it.
“Better work on that, Prowl,” Smokescreen laughed.
“Prowl out.”
Smokescreen shook his head and glanced at the empty cell. “Welcome to the fold Jazz,” he snorted, “welcome to the fold.”
-=/\=-
When Jazz finally showed up, Smokescreen handed the orders over to him and waited for the inevitable response. It was bound to be spectacular.
“What?!”
“You are to be transferred to the Praxus forces for an indefinite amount of time,” Smokescreen recited from memory, “You are to answer to commander Smokescreen and beta commander Prowl for the duration of your time in Praxus.”
Jazz groaned, “I get it, I get it. Primus. What is going through those mechs’ processors anyway?”
Smokescreen shrugged, “I don’t particularly care to speculate. I do not have enough information to form a hypothesis.”
Jazz scowled, “It’s all just numbers and statistics and all that slag with you, isn’t it?”
Smokescreen eyed Jazz for a long moment, then let himself smile and flash a Polyhex wink, “We, preprogrammed mechs that is, simply let others think that is all that we think about. It is easier.”
Jazz stared. He had worked with many preprogrammed mechs before, and most of them did think that the numbers were most important… didn’t they?
If they thought about more, why would they hide it?
From manual labor to even these tactical mechs, all he had seen were the way that they nearly worshipped the data points.
…Only, that wasn’t exactly true, was it?
Prowl certainly didn’t seem that way, even if he was about as graceful socially as cyberslug was small. And then Smokescreen, just now… They didn’t seem like the typical preprogrammed mechs at all. If they were just letting him see a different side of them, then, was he completely wrong about preprogrammed mechs? Was everyone wrong about them?
-=/\=-
Smokescreen eyed the two empty seats in the briefing room. Just before they would be late, Prowl came in, dragging Jazz behind him.
Jazz was snickering and Prowl was simply stressed. From the way Prowl kept fidgeting, Smokescreen could tell that whatever it was that made them both almost late had not been resolved.
“Prowl, Jazz,” Smokescreen hid his smile behind his frowning at the pair of them, “Tardiness is not acceptable. Make sure that you are on time.”
Prowl’s horrified face, and Jazz’s annoyed one seemed to match, oddly enough.
It seemed that having empty seat where there should be mechs had become an increasingly common event all throughout the base. Most of the mech cited Jazz as the cause of their lack of appearance, whether from a prank, being waylaid, asked for help, or even sent on turbofox chases. And most of them also seemed to be transitioning from preprogrammed standard to a more emotional standard much faster than usual.
As much as the chaos of several mechs all deciding to start writing emotional protocols and initiating them ran Smokescreen ragged, the diversionary tactician was proud of his mechs. Despite the agitation that he caused all too often, Jazz was an admirable spar-
Smokescreen yelped as glitter poured all over him.
Smokescreen glared at Jazz, but he only pointed a blaming claw towards a mortified Prowl.
Jazz was an admirable, pain-in-the-aft spark, that was.
Prowl’s guilty stance said it all. This was Prowl’s fault? What was Cyberton coming to? …Apparently, Jazz was having even more of an effect on his mechs than he had thought.
Author: AotA
Rating: K
Warnings: Prowl is acting kind of oddly
Characters: Smokescreen, Prowl, Jazz
Setting: AU bayverse, see notes
Summary: Empty seats seem to becoming a more common phenomenon all around base and it all started with Jazz.
Notes: Written for Prompt #1 “a room with an empty seat which should be occupied” November 6, 2010, off of tf_speedwriting . I took 61 minutes. Once again, this is Smokescreen out of my 100 drabble ‘verse, and the link to the listing is here. Please note that the links to each drabble are put into the list chronologically once they are written, even though they are written out of order and have some large time skips. The list is continuously updated.
Smokescreen frowned at the empty cell, and the seat which most definitely did not have a mech occupying it.
Looking left, looking right, then up to see if the mech in question was hiding on the ceiling and coming up with nothing, Smokescreen chirped an inquiry to Prowl.
“I am escorting him,” Prowl sent back.
Smokescreen was puzzled, normally, Prowl wasn’t the type to go out on a limb to do anything like take a prisoner out of his cell, no matter whether said prisoner was one who was merely a prisoner out of bad luck or not.
“Why?” Smokescreen asked.
“He was about to leave. I figured that it was prudent to circumvent his need to take such measures by allowing him out of his cell in a more proper manner.”
Smokescreen frowned, in a manner of speaking… that was indeed logical, but by another, it was the most illogical thing that he had ever heard Prowl say. The typical response to a suspected escape attempt was not to take the prisoner for a walk, but to tighten the holding measures. Still…
“Just make sure you don’t lose him,” Smokescreen told the other tactician. So long as it was Jazz, who was in fact not a criminal, and not one of those who were just waiting for deactivation, such unorthodox measures coming from Prowl were a good sign.
If Jazz went missing, whether when he was in a Praxus cell or not, it would reflect poorly upon the Praxus force, and, Smokescreen suspected, it would also reflect poorly upon Jazz as well.
Smokescreen was waiting for a response from Jazz handler before he could release the intelligence agent.
“Of course, sir,” Prowl acknowledged.
-=/\=-
Smokescreen came by Jazz’s cell once more, and was unsurprised to see that, once again, it was empty.
Smokescreen sighed and pinged Prowl once more, “Is Jazz with you?”
“Yes sir.”
“Tell him that I need to speak with him.”
“I will, sir.”
“Prowl?” Smokescreen sighed, “Please stop with the ‘sir’s.”
“Yes sir!” Prowl said, and Smokescreen heard the hint of cheekiness in it.
“Better work on that, Prowl,” Smokescreen laughed.
“Prowl out.”
Smokescreen shook his head and glanced at the empty cell. “Welcome to the fold Jazz,” he snorted, “welcome to the fold.”
-=/\=-
When Jazz finally showed up, Smokescreen handed the orders over to him and waited for the inevitable response. It was bound to be spectacular.
“What?!”
“You are to be transferred to the Praxus forces for an indefinite amount of time,” Smokescreen recited from memory, “You are to answer to commander Smokescreen and beta commander Prowl for the duration of your time in Praxus.”
Jazz groaned, “I get it, I get it. Primus. What is going through those mechs’ processors anyway?”
Smokescreen shrugged, “I don’t particularly care to speculate. I do not have enough information to form a hypothesis.”
Jazz scowled, “It’s all just numbers and statistics and all that slag with you, isn’t it?”
Smokescreen eyed Jazz for a long moment, then let himself smile and flash a Polyhex wink, “We, preprogrammed mechs that is, simply let others think that is all that we think about. It is easier.”
Jazz stared. He had worked with many preprogrammed mechs before, and most of them did think that the numbers were most important… didn’t they?
If they thought about more, why would they hide it?
From manual labor to even these tactical mechs, all he had seen were the way that they nearly worshipped the data points.
…Only, that wasn’t exactly true, was it?
Prowl certainly didn’t seem that way, even if he was about as graceful socially as cyberslug was small. And then Smokescreen, just now… They didn’t seem like the typical preprogrammed mechs at all. If they were just letting him see a different side of them, then, was he completely wrong about preprogrammed mechs? Was everyone wrong about them?
-=/\=-
Smokescreen eyed the two empty seats in the briefing room. Just before they would be late, Prowl came in, dragging Jazz behind him.
Jazz was snickering and Prowl was simply stressed. From the way Prowl kept fidgeting, Smokescreen could tell that whatever it was that made them both almost late had not been resolved.
“Prowl, Jazz,” Smokescreen hid his smile behind his frowning at the pair of them, “Tardiness is not acceptable. Make sure that you are on time.”
Prowl’s horrified face, and Jazz’s annoyed one seemed to match, oddly enough.
It seemed that having empty seat where there should be mechs had become an increasingly common event all throughout the base. Most of the mech cited Jazz as the cause of their lack of appearance, whether from a prank, being waylaid, asked for help, or even sent on turbofox chases. And most of them also seemed to be transitioning from preprogrammed standard to a more emotional standard much faster than usual.
As much as the chaos of several mechs all deciding to start writing emotional protocols and initiating them ran Smokescreen ragged, the diversionary tactician was proud of his mechs. Despite the agitation that he caused all too often, Jazz was an admirable spar-
Smokescreen yelped as glitter poured all over him.
Smokescreen glared at Jazz, but he only pointed a blaming claw towards a mortified Prowl.
Jazz was an admirable, pain-in-the-aft spark, that was.
Prowl’s guilty stance said it all. This was Prowl’s fault? What was Cyberton coming to? …Apparently, Jazz was having even more of an effect on his mechs than he had thought.