A.k.a. the Curious Incident of Too Many Prowls. Starscream will never look at Prowl the same, but neither will Smokescreen.

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Title: Playing the Long Odds

Warnings: Autobots. Awkward. _.

Rating: PG-13

Continuity: G1

Characters: Autobots, Smokescreen, Prowl

Disclaimer: The theatre doesn't own the script or actors.

Motivation (Prompt): "_." Commission by DisplacedNoble.

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Part One

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Humans had a saying: 'There aren't enough hours in the day.'

Due to Blaster paraphrasing that saying during an officer meeting, the Autobots now had their own version of the old adage: 'There aren't enough Prowls in the fray.'

"If there were more of me, I would not be dodging the Decepticons' best efforts to take me out," the tactician said in response, unamused by the communication specialist's humor. The rest of the table laughed, but he kept his frown. The literal interpretation was more interesting than a silly idea. "Soundwave has proven too difficult to fool. He inevitably tracks down my location if I am not onsite at the battle itself, and there are two or more Decepticons assigned priority orders to attack me in every battle. Multiples of myself would at least spread the target zone out."

"Wait, are ya really thinking I said that seriously?" Blaster threw his hands up. "Whoa, now. The world couldn't take more of ya, my mech!"

Engine rumbling in subdued amusement, Optimus Prime nodded agreement to both of them. "I can see the benefits. Not only would it distract the strike teams sent after you, but I can only imagine the looks on the Decepticons' faces. Starscream would have a - what does Spike call it?" An inquisitive look went down the table at Ratchet. "Hissycow?"

"Hissyfit, I think. Conniption?"

"Aneurysm."

The medic grunted and folded his arms. "Stress doesn't directly cause that, and regrettably, that's a human-only illness."

"I can change that." A statement promptly followed by everyone at the table turning to Wheeljack as the engineer sat up straight. "Not exactly, of course, but I can create a localized weapon to replicated the pressure and an electric surge to mimic the bursting of a swollen blood vessel in the brain."

"You can engineer a stroke?" Ratchet looked at his friend like he'd grown a second head. "No, revise that statement. Why would you want to engineer a stroke?"

Wheeljack already had a program open on his datapad, sketching in quick motions of his fingertips. "Quiz time, doc! Initial symptoms include fatigue, confusion, trouble balancing and speaking, and seeing double. What's your treatment plan?"

The whole table drew back into their seats with a dramatic, "Oooo." Engineer versus medic: it was on.

Although the drama was subdued at best. Ratchet confined himself to tapping his fingers on his forearm. "Don't call me that. And those symptoms don't fit any known Cybertronian ailment."

"No warning flags went up."

"None. I'd prefer to keep the affected mech under observation, but speculating from post-battle conditions in their repairbay and the Constructicons' excuse for regular treatment plans…"

"Recharge?" One finger went up, ready to chalk a point up for the engineering side of the battle.

Ratchet blew out a deep vent. "Recharge."

The finger scored its point. Wheeljack's audio fins glittered bright white in smug triumph.

Ironhide collected his winnings from Red Alert. Between them, the medic glowered at the overpowered gun being forked over into Ironhide's tender care. Red Alert grumbled something, and there might have been cooing from Ironhide's side. His precious, precious confiscated gun, oh yes, come back to papa's arms.

Ratchet shook his head at the doting and dragged his attention back to Wheeljack. "Assuming you built the symptoms slowly enough, a minor case like that would probably be told to reboot and recharge for at least twelve hours in a cool room. If the balance and sight problems are more irritating than debilitating - "

"Or entertaining," Jazz threw out. He was inching his seat closer to Wheeljack's to sneak a peek at the thingymajig. "Decepticons, remember."

" - right, or entertaining, I'd recommend a full defrag. Secondary treatment plan would be to have the patient report to the medbay for recalibration of gyroscopes and sensory systems if a complete recharge didn't fix things."

Wheeljack hummed acknowledgement. "Giving my device at least twelve to fourteen hours to work its way through cerebral circuitry and implant a trail of microscopic explosives. Nothing magnetic, so it needs to rely on something less sophisticatedin order to evade a quick medical scan."

"Plastic explosive," Red Alert and Ironhide said at the same time.

Suddenly looking a bit trapped in his seat, Ratchet flicked his optics from side to side. Something about the complete confidence in their voices rather alarmed him.

The Security Director and Weapons Specialist didn't notice, both busy giving sage nods. "C-4 wouldn't be picked up by a medical scanner."

"Security scan, certainly, but not a medical one. Despite numerous warnings by me, you still don't include checking for common human sabotage in your treatment plans." Ratchet's optics held contemplation in them as he eyed the finger wagged in his face. Red Alert wisely withdrew it before it got bitten. "Ah. Not that I'm dictating how you should run your medbay. Just giving you some urgently needed advice."

"I'm hoping that 'common' deale-o's just paranoia on your part," Blaster murmured as teeth snapped just a second too late.

Red Alert was busy hiding his hands under his elbows and leaning away from Ratchet's predator's grin, so Ironhide answered the not-quite-a-question. "No harm in bein' prepared. Humans ain't always out for our best interests, and Earth's putty explosives are different than ours. More primitive, but sticky as anything and meant to be set off in smaller amounts than we use most of the time. Quiet bangs, too. Wouldn't hear dabs of it goin' off under a helm. Set it off while a mech's still in recharge, it could get passed off as a bad defrag."

"Noted," Wheeljack said, cheerful in the way only he could be when inventing. His datapad had a working model sketched on the screen. Jazz leaned over his arm to scribble upside down on the blueprint. "And here it is! A miniature crawler device meant to plant explosives on vital cerebral circuitry, implanted in the subject via a," he squinted at Jazz's notes, "'friendly hug by Yours Truly.'"

"A hug?" Optimus Prime asked his Head of SpecOps. "I wasn't aware you and Starscream were on such good terms."

"Are you kidding? Me and Screamer haven't shouted at each other in ages. We gotta lot to catch up on." Jazz leaned back in his seat and spread his arms, smirking lazily. "All I need's a good distraction to pop on over and get reacquainted."

"That is where I come in, I take it." Skeptical or not, Prowl had the defensive strategies they'd been discussing up on his screen, and he'd multiplied his icon. The possibility of taking out the Decepticon Air Commander via sabotage was worth the potential absurdity. "You have yet to answer how I will clone myself."

The officers glanced at each other, questioning, but their Prime came to the rescue. His chair creaked as he sat back, optics thoughtful. "It only has to be a distraction."

"The longer the better. The more stressed Starscream is during the battle, the more likely it is he'll consider his symptoms stress-related instead of external." Wheeljack was beginning to flesh out his sketch, a fascinated blue visor peered over fingers clamped onto his arm. Doors quivered behind the excited saboteur as Jazz watched chaos in the making. Wheeljack always spawned better drama than 'As The Kitchen Sinks,' although nobody had gotten pregnant. Yet, anyway.

"Also the more likely he'll torque Megatron off and think a backhand's just rattled him," Jazz added. "I'll add goading him to my To-Do list. Get him mad enough to pick a fight, he'll end up demoted to the bottom of the Constructicons' repair queue. I prick him right, he might be too proud to report he's feelin' funny 'cause he doesn't wanna look weak."

Ironhide left Jazz to his scheming and focused on the hidden delinquent mastermind in their midst. Most of the Autobots onboard the Ark didn't know their Prime had once engaged in prank wars, and they would remain in ignorance. The mech had minions to do his mischief for him, now. "What're ya thinking, Prime?"

Optimus Prime steepled his fingers in his best imitation of a thoughtful, wise leader pose. He fooled no one. "I'm thinking that if I mistake Bluestreak for Prowl one more time, I'm going to repaint one of you bright orange."

They all took a moment to picture that. Right, Earth vehicles. Time constraints and frame requirements had limited everyone's selection when they'd awoken on Earth, and only some of the Autobots had ever bothered to search out more variety. There were three Autobots on Earth who had picked the same altmode to match their distinctive Praxian frametype. None of them had changed despite the mix-ups their appearance sometimes caused.

From a distance, they were easily mistaken for each other. Up close? Not a chance. The colors were a dead giveaway. Besides which, if Bluestreak wasn't chattering, it'd be Smokescreen's easy smile or Prowl's stiff formality that made them easy to tell apart. They were nothing alike in personality.

But the Decepticons wouldn't notice, at least not at first. Not if they had the same paintjob.

"It would be effective camouflage," Prowl said. His optics stared into the middle distance as he turned the idea over in his mind.

"Smokes and Blue don't gotta ape you to confuse ol' Soundwave," Blaster said, grinning. "You guys just have to act like each other. Keep switching who's who, and it'll take at least ten minutes to sort out which of you is the real deal. Twenty, if you keep moving around. That'll spread out the 'Con's strike teams and give Screamer something to shriek about."

Prowl blinked his optics back into focus to give him a mild look. "I was referring to the benefits of an orange paintjob within the ship."

There was a beat of silence.

Red Alert twitched. Blaster fizzled a dead mech's static laugh right as Jazz recoiled so hard he fell off his seat. A distraught wail of, "We'd never see him coming!" came from the floor. Ratchet had both hands on the table and one foot on the edge of his chair, ready to scramble over the back, and Ironhide had flung one arm in front of the medic in an instinctive protective gesture.

Objectively speaking, Prowl blending into any wall of the Ark he stopped in front of shouldn't have sent a thrill of horror through them. Realistically, however, that meant Prowl could lurk anywhere and see anything.

One corner of the tactician's mouth quirked up, but Prowl merely inclined his head. "Precisely."

At the head of the table, Optimus Prime rubbed his chin and didn't react to Red Alert huffing and furiously typing notes into a datapad beside him. "I don't think I thought all the ramifications of the orange idea through. Hmm." He shrugged. "Yes, well, it's an idea for another day. For now, let's concentrate on matching Smokescreen and Bluestreak to you." A high-performance engine snarled, but the Prime patted Red Alert's shoulder. Somewhat gingerly, as the mech resembled a nuke waiting to go off. "Three Prowls on the ship will keep the troublemakers in line for a while, don't you agree?"

Fingers froze mid-word. The look on Red Alert's face made Jazz groan in dismay, and Ratchet squawked as Ironhide hauled his chair away from the table. They were joking, but there were evil plans afoot. Yes, such plans, indeed.

Optic alight, the Security Director actually rubbed his hands together and cackled a long, sinister, "Yesssssss." The typing resumed at a much higher speed.

Optimus Prime heaved a sigh. "What have I done?" Blaster and Jazz both raised their hands, ready to answer. "That was a rhetorical question."

What he'd done was start a whisper campaign. Making a formal announcement of a covert operation would be foolishness, so that unleashed the power of gossip upon the Ark. Perhaps as a testimony of how much power it had, by the end of the third shift, everyone knew what was going on without having been officially told. They knew without knowing, and therefore the risk of intercepted information plummeted, because there was nothing to be intercepted. Just whispers about what was obviously fact.

"According to scuttlebutt," Smokescreen said when he reported to the Prime's office the next day, "I don't exist and never did. Neither does Bluestreak."

Optimus Prime chuckled and spread his hands. "Ever heard about the mech who wasn't there?"

"Since I'm apparently him, you'd think I would have. But no. Who's the mech who wasn't there?"

"It's a poem by a human, but I think it applies. 'Yesterday, upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there. He wasn't there again today, I wish, I wish he'd go away...'"

While the Prime settled behind the desk to recite the poem, Smokescreen took his usual seat, dragging one of the chairs in front of the desk over to set beside it where they could talk as equals instead of as commander to lowly soldier. These private meetings were nothing new, and he knew his role, here.

The Matrix-Bearer had never been intended to be a military leader. A civilian leader was considered the first among equals. Even as a leader, Optimus Prime could have shed his rank to walk the streets of Cybertron if he'd wished. It was that equality and closeness to the people that he lacked as a military commander. His officers couldn't give him that, but Smokescreen could. He could walk among the Autobots for his leader and report to him as a friend. It was all unofficially official, of course, but the gambler had a poker face that could fool Jazz. He used it to play equal to his Prime during these meetings, because the mech behind the Matrix needed a friend who wasn't trapped in the military structure.

For all his flaws, the gambler possessed an easy camaraderie that allowed him to be his commanding officer's friend when the situation called for it. It did, more often than anyone else would ever know, but his friendly nature also gave him access to the rest of the Autobot ranks. The officers couldn't get that floor-level access, not once they were promoted. No matter how nice an officer, he was still an officer. Mechs knew to be wary of having opinions around officers.

Having an opinion around Smokescreen? The mech was a soldier, one of the ranks just like them. He was their buddy.

A buddy who happened to be the Prime's buddy, too, which meant that word funneled directly to the top through him. It eventually reached Optimus Prime's audios by different sources, but distorted and censored by passage through the officers. Regular check-ups on the Autobots' morale and current gossip in the form of Smokescreen kept the Prime up to date via an uninterrupted pipeline of information.

It wasn't common knowledge, of course. The chain of command went up to the Prime, but Autobots didn't just report straight to him. That's not how a chain of command worked. Therefore, Smokescreen existed outside the chain. Technically, on file and officially, he was a soldier in the normal ranks. Unofficially, off the record, he was under the Prime's command and only the Prime's.

He had to be. If he had to report half of the opinions he gathered to any other officer, he'd be tempted to edit in case a sudden bout of 'shoot the messenger' popped up. The information he turned up had to be secure and true, sometimes brutally so, and the only guarantee of that was to ensure the officers couldn't touch him.

Not that the Autobot officers didn't try to squeeze him occasionally. Sometimes, what Smokescreen found out didn't flatter in the slightest. There weren't a lot of officers who knew about his unofficial position under the Prime, but he knew every single one of them because, at one point or another, they'd all sidled over to maybe, sort of, kind of hint that the Prime didn't really need to hear about that thing. That…that thing. The thing that didn't need to be spoken of.

Smokescreen was extraordinarily glad he was under the Prime's command, because the couple time it'd been Jazz or Ratchet dropping delicate hints about not passing on information, he'd hidden behind that rank. They couldn't make his life a living Pit without bringing their leader down on them, and thank Primus for that.

Admittedly, it might have given him a somewhat casual attitude toward authority. He tried not to rely on it, but when the cards were wrong, luck needed an extra boost. There were a couple officers out there who resented him because of that. He really felt like an idiot when he pulled that trick, because it never paid to dismiss authority figures. That, and he inevitably ended up reporting his own lack of respect to Optimus Prime. Combining friend and commanding officer required a careful touch and complete honesty, even at the cost of disappointing said friend and officer.

Yeah, Smokescreen didn't like doing that. Imagining facing the Prime kept his attitude in check, for the most part.

This might be the straw that broke his tenuous respect for officer authority, however. "You want us to disappear?" Hooking his elbows over the back of his chair, he crossed his legs and gave Optimus a doubtful look. "Bluestreak's not very good at stealth. You can get everyone to act like we're not there, but he'll give us away."

"Not quite. The poem's referring to a dead man's ghost, someone who's there but can't be proven to be. We don't want you and Bluestreak to disappear." A quick grab laid three datapads out in a row on the desk in front of them. "We want you to be Prowl, to make the Decepticons see a mech who wasn't there. When he's there," Optimus tapped his forefinger on the middle datapad, "they won't see him for you." He set his hands on the outside pair. "When you're there, they won't be able to tell that he's not. We want nobody to be able to tell which one you are. They'll either start double-guessing themselves and spread themselves thin targeting all of you, or start focusing their efforts on figuring out who's the real Prowl." His hands mixed the datapads about, rearranging the order. Smokescreen watched with a gambler's appreciative optic for the practiced motion. Little known fact: Optimus could out-fake a faker on shell games. "The idea is that if we paint the three of you to look alike and you do your best to impersonate each other, no one will be able to tell who is really whom."

"You impersonate Bluestreak, who impersonates Prowl, who impersonates you, and switch at random." Datapads shuffled and spun, ending in a neat stack, and blue optics smiled at Smokescreen over them. "'When I came home last night at three, the man was waiting there for me.'" Hands spread, indicating the identical devices. Smokescreen couldn't pick one out of the pile. "'But when I looked around the hall, I couldn't see him there at all!'"

The gambler stared in silence at the stack for a long moment, doors flexing behind the chair as he thought. Finally, he shook his head and gave his friend that easy smile. "So first impression aside, the plan's to make us visible. Really visible. Visible everywhere." He liked how the poem had been interpreted. A mech who seemed to be everywhere but actually wasn't; that was a mech who couldn't be caught. Sure, it made targets of him and Bluestreak, but it would allow the Autobots' best tactical mind to move freely.

He'd put his life on the line in far more dangerous operations. Besides, this way he got to look like Prowl for a week or better. A hundred things to do jumped straight to the forefront of his thoughts.

"Don't abuse this," Ratchet sighed while affixing the fake pieces of plating. They smoothed out the tips of his helm chevron to Prowl's exact measurements. "A reputation is a difficult thing to repair. I suppose it'd be too much to ask that you keep your mouth shut as much as possible?"

"I really don't know if I can do that, I mean, I'm not very good at that," Bluestreak said, assuming it'd been aimed at him. The younger Praxian fidgeted nervously but stilled before Sunstreaker did more than draw back the paint sprayer and glare. Offering an apologetic smile, Bluestreak contented himself by playing with his fingers instead of moving around and screwing up the new paintjob. "I can try, honest! I just think we all know that silence and I aren't on good terms. I don't think this is a great idea. Of course I'll try! But nobody's going to look at me and think 'hey, that's Prowl! Wow, he's talkative today. When did he start talking about TV shows and Earth trivia? Did he learn to smile? I didn't know Prowl could smile. Good for him. He has a sniper rifle! That's new, but no way is that Bluestreak. Surely that's Prowl, because look at the Prowl-like paint. I can't possible doubt that's Prowl.' You know what I mean? It's just not going to work like that."

Across the medbay, Prowl looked up, opened his mouth to comment on the somewhat unflattering stream of words - and closed it again. Sunstreaker snickered and Wheeljack had a minor giggle fit over at his workbench, but Prowl just shook his head. That was Bluestreak, all right. The gunner babbled, and so long as he was babbling, his hands remained rock-steady and his mind could operate inside the cloud of comforting background noise. Everyone else's conscious mind concentrated to produce words while the back of their mind streamed subconscious connections, memories, and thoughts. In a mech like Bluestreak, whose past trauma filled that subconscious stream the second he stopped distracting himself, the best solution had been to let that part take over moving his mouth.

It led to an obnoxious amount of unfiltered chatter, but the mech couldn't stop himself without ending up a shuddering ball of trauma victim. As a side effect, there were worse options than nonstop talking. At least the mech could be counted on to be honest. He'd said what the rest of the room was thinking.

Prowl went back to working where he sat on another repair berth. He had another ten minutes while the welds cooled on his new back structure. Wheeljack had produced a couple of protopulser guns in no time flat to dress his shoulders up like the other two Datsuns, but the weapons required support kibble. Prowl had never installed shoulder weaponry due to his lack of software compatibility with gunmounts. The protopulsers were functional but ran by manual targeting and firing control, all powered by an external power pack.

Once the structure was ready, Wheeljack would settle the gun into place and head over to install supports under Bluestreak's shoulder weapons to match them to Smokescreen's. After Ratchet finished making small aesthetic corrections to their frames, Sunstreaker got his turn. He painted them to look alike. By the time he was done, there were three Prowls sitting around the medbay.

"Creepy," Sunstreaker decided after taking a long look at the group of Prowls. "What do you call a herd of Prowls? An authority? A patrol of Prowls?"

"'Cons won't know what to think," Wheeljack said. He seemed particularly proud of that. Tools clattered as he packed his kit up to haul back to his lab, but he kept instructing Prowl on the use of the new guns as he worked. "The power pack's hidden under your altmode's roof, so remember you're down to two passenger seats, now. You don't want humans anywhere near the power supply or ammo feeds when you fire in altmode, and keep in mind that they're not connected to your powerplant. They're good until their tanks run out or the pack's discharged."

Experimenting with moving the guns up and down on his shoulders, Prowl nodded and made a note of the warning.

Ratchet puffed air out his vents and kicked aside an empty paint can to sit down on a stool. "Any thoughts on how you're going to pass?"

Surprisingly, the question was directed at Bluestreak. Well, surprising if a mech didn't know how the sniper's mind worked. Just because he sounded like a blithering idiot 90% of the time didn't mean his mind couldn't cut, it was so sharp. The mech was a sniper. He had the ability to calculate angles and battlefield positioning in the beat of a fuel pump. His condition just meant he blurted out a lot of meaningless noise in comparison to the rest of the time.

So while he'd been talking at everyone here in the medbay, he'd been thinking. "Yeah! Sort of. I don't think I'll ever make a passable Prowl for the Autobots, but we just have to fool the Decepticons, and now that we got our voice synthesizers synced, even Soundwave can't pick us out by voice, so we just have to talk right and act a bit. I got this idea about how I can stay quiet for a while and maybe be less like me, which is a good thing because maybe they'll figure out me and Smokescreen are part of the authority," Sunstreaker snorted a laugh, "but we can keep them guessing for a while if we're all acting off, and I think that's the point, right?"

It took them a second to realize he'd paused for a response instead of for effect. "Oh. Yes, that is the point." Prowl nodded at his doppelganger. "What is your idea?"

Bluestreak's face lit up. "Open commlines to Blaster! It wouldn't be totally secure but it never is, and during battle we've all got commlines open, so if he's got it encrypted it'll at least take Soundwave some time to crack it, but that shouldn't matter while we're in the base, and it's in the base that we need to start practicing. If we've got a line open to Blaster, he can coordinate with Red Alert about who's where and doing what anyway to keep us from running into each other too frequently and giving away the game to any Decepticon spies, and then I can talk to him, and it's just something Jazz said once about when I'm talking over internal comm, because you know how hard it is to concentrate on two conversations at once but I should disable my vocalizer, too, just in case, so I really have to stop and think about sounding all Prowl-like before I actually talk - "

"Bluestreak! Rewind that," Ratchet said through the excited babble, rolling his hand like he could physically go back. "What did Jazz say about you talking on your comm?"

No insult taken on Bluestreak's end for the interruption, since he was used to mechs picking stuff out of his river of words. "He said I looked completely different. I was kind of insulted at the time because I thought he was making fun of me, but now I think we can use it, and that's okay. I can show you. Hold on, I'll call Blaster."

The other Autobots in the medbay watched, interested, as the normally bubbly gunner went silent, attention drawing inward. His doors drew up in a subtle tension, a slight closure of habitually open body language as it channeled into whatever conversation he'd started over internal commlink, and his optics dimmed a couple shades into a darker blue. Animated gestures and active facial features dropped to almost nothing as he concentrated on speaking to Blaster. It gave him a somber, thoughtful appearance. One finger tapped where his hands had come to rest on his thighs.

Out of nowhere, there was another Prowl where Bluestreak in a new paintjob had been sitting.

Unnerved, Sunstreaker said, "That's just wrong."

"Except for the posture, the resemblance is uncanny." Wheeljack edged closer to press his hand to Prowl #2's lower back under the altmode roof. Bluestreak sat up straight. Still thoroughly distracted, he gave the engineer a small smile that looked oddly familiar. "There, that's better."

"Fragging Primus, that's even more wrong."

"Hush, you. Good job, Bluestreak. Great idea."

The small smile grew into a wide grin. Combined with Bluestreak's attention mostly elsewhere, it had a relaxed ease to it that made its odd familiarity even more pronounced. Ratchet glanced at Smokescreen, who nodded back. "Looks a bit like me, doesn't he?"

Prowl - the real Prowl - frowned at them both. "I do not understand how you can tell. That looks like my smile." They gave him the same look, and he frowned harder. "Do not say I do not smile. I smile when the circumstances call for it."

"Yeah, once you've analyzed it down to precisely how wide a smile is appropriate for the occasion. It shows. That," Ratchet pointed, "is not your smile."

"It looks good on you," Smokescreen added, letting his amusement show through. Prowl stiffened and gave him a startled look, doors jerking up behind his shoulders, either at the opinion or from seeing his own face smile back at him.

Ratchet nodded. "That it does. We're going to have to work on your ability to imitate these two," he jerked his thumb at Smokescreen and nodded toward Bluestreak. Prowl's frown lightened into a pensive expression, and Ratchet looked at Smokescreen, a.k.a. Prowl #3. "How about you? Got any tricks you can pull?"

Smokescreen shrugged and hopped up to sit on a berth with his hands curled over the edge. Leaning forward, he projected cheerful, eager curiosity as strong as he could. "Y'know, I think I do! It's gonna be harder than I thought to talk forever and an age, but I think I can manage to keep my vocalizer from going up in smoke, and do you think vocalizers do that? By the way, we're going to need to requisition sniper rifles for all of us to pull this off, because you know me and my sniper rifle, you'll never see me far from it. In fact, has anyone considered meeting in the shooting range to talk while doing target practice? I need to sharpen my sharp-shooting, but since I'm Prowl, then I need some datapads to bury my nose in all the slagging time, so somebody get me the codes to Prow - my office so I can do desk work. Throw me some easy files to mess around with, and I think we'll be set."

He stopped kicking his heels and sat up straight, lowering his doors and lifting his chin to meet Ratchet's optics evenly. "I am sure more than crossword puzzles can be arranged to keep me occupied."

A thin whine of air sucking in against vent fans came from Sunstreaker's direction. Everyone looked at him. The golden frontliner had his painting kit held to his chest like an elderly woman clutching her pearls, and he stared at the authority of Prowls in front of him as if they were the Unmaker unchained. "Gahhhhh."

"…I think that'll do." Ratchet patted one of the Prowls on the shoulder. It was difficult to tell which at that moment. "That'll do just fine."

It did. While Bluestreak's imitation of Smokescreen worked better than his attempt at being Prowl-like, Smokescreen could pull off a credible Prowl act to fill in the gaps. Prowl required a lot of coaching in how to loosen up enough to pass as either of them, but it was working! The authority of Prowls swept through the Ark like a disciplinary super force, practicing their acts and coordinating with Blaster, all while confounding their fellow Autobots.

The adjustment period for having three Prowls out and about was short and somewhat brutal, as law and order descended on three different locations at once with the office of Autobot Second-in-Command backing them. The Aerialbots ended up with six citations for disorderly conduct on their records. Sideswipe took to sitting in his quarters any time he was off-duty after the day three Prowls caught him speeding, one right after another. That was enough to freak out a regular mech, much less a troublemaker like him. Jazz got two citations. Ratchet weaseled out of his by blaming Ironhide, who just shrugged and took the black tick on his record.

The only reason there wasn't a betting pool on guessing who was whom was because Bluestreak and Smokescreen? Who were they? Nope, just Prowls here. The Prowls were acting like Prowls, so no guessing needed.

The trio of Datsuns werebusy getting their imitations down pat. Hopefully, by the time the Decepticons pulled their next stunt, the Autobots' flawless innocent act would confuse the circuits off them. Starscream was going to hate the next battle, even before Jazz tagged him with Wheeljack's device.

Meanwhile, an authority of Prowls caused the exact opposite of chaos wherever they went. Everything was going exactly as planned.

With the exception of one small incident.

"Prowl #2's been insisting Prowl #1 keeps staring at him," Jazz announced at the next general officer meeting. Nothing terribly important would be covered this week, so Prowl #3 was playing the part of the original today. Anything to throw off Decepticon spies a little more.

Smokescreen gave Jazz his best disinterested look. "How is this significant?"

"Weeeeell," the saboteur drew out, "#2's sayin' he won't leave the office until #1 cuts it out with the funny looks, and #1's insisting he did no such thing, so now they're wagin' a passive-aggressive war over who gets the office."

"Fighting over getting to lock himself away to do filework." Ratchet ran a hand down his face. "Only Prowl would do that. Only Prowl."

"What kind of 'funny looks' is…other Prowl accusing Prowl of?" Optimus Prime asked.

For the first time, Jazz's amusement took a dent. "Uh…" The officers gave him expectant looks, and he shifted from side to side in his chair. "Here's the thing. Prowl 2.0 showed me the look, and I get that he's exaggeratin', but it is kinda weird. Lemme just be Prowl a minute." He sat up straight and picked up a datapad to play the part of Prowl. He glanced across the table and nodded to Ratchet. "You're Prowl the Second. Pretend to be working on something." The medic gave him a cynical look but picked up a datapad of his own. "And here's the look."

The most lovey-dovey, sappy, utterly smitten expression pasted itself over Jazz's features as he gazed at Ratchet. His visor stared, unwavering limpid blue.

Ratchet looked up, and Jazz ducked his head, face going blank. The second Ratchet went back to pretending to work, he fixated again. The corner of Ratchet's mouth pulled down the third time he caught Jazz staring. Mild interest became uneasiness the longer Jazz kept it up, and the rest of the table reset their optics when the medic finally set the datapad down with a loud click.

"Yeah, that's strange." Ratchet cleared his throat and gave their current member of the Prowl clan a strange look of his own. "Have you noticed anything like that?"

"No. I would think I would recognize such a look if I saw it." And now he was tempted to try it himself the next time he had anything to use as a mirror. He couldn't imagine Prowl, of all mechs, giving Bluestreak that look. A lovesick lover pining for his darling would be less obvious.

Blaster clapped his hands when the silence drew out too long. "Right! Okay, if you haven't seen it," he pointed with both forefingers, "and don't have a problem with it, then I'll just steer our talkative Prowler in another direction when his more stoic brethren's incoming. Ladies and gentlemechs," he boomed in his best announcer voice, and Red Alert facepalmed beside him, "this week's Running of the Prowls will be directed by moi and a lucky volunteer from the crowd. Now don't all of you volunteer at once - yes, the lucky contestant down in front!" Jazz stopped wildly waving his hand and gave Ironhide and Optimus Prime a triumphant smirk. "Thank you, and remember that management is not responsible for any trampling that may occur." Jazz's head whipped around, surprise in his visor. Blaster winked at him. "I hear some of them get feisty."

Ironhide and Optimus Prime gave their suddenly dismayed fellow officer identical smug looks. Thought he'd won, had he? Ha!

Blaster grinned wider. "Ándaleándale, arriba arriba!"

Smokescreen didn't waggle his optic ridges like he would if he'd been wearing his own paintjob, but he let one pop upward. He added it to his best deadpan Prowl expression. "I am not Speedy Gonzales."

However, he was curious. He had never, ever thought about - much less seen - Prowl giving anyone that kind of look. Granted, it was a look as translated via Bluestreak's expressive face and presented by Jazz, who had probably exaggerated even further for comedic effect, but still. What a weird look.

So Smokescreen started watching for it. And watching for it. And not seeing it. What was he missing?

"Frag," Ironhide muttered to him when they sat together in the common room. The old red mech had stolen a look over his door and evidently caught Prowl (original flavor) at it. "How come I ain't seen that before?"

"What?" Smokescreen didn't spin around, but he did turn to exchange cordial nods with, uh, himself. Prowl looked the same as always, which was to say, reserved and stiffly formal. Seriously, why couldn't he see what everyone else had started commenting on? Ratchet had confirmed it. Wheeljack had backed him up as of yesterday, and Jazz had just started looking thoughtful out of nowhere. Now Ironhide had seen it, too, and this was getting just plain ridiculous.

Smokescreen studied Prowl and frowned to himself. An extra brightness boosted the stoic mech's optics to Bluestreak's level, and he was carrying a rifle scope as if he'd been checking it for errors, but it was a thin act. Smokescreen knew he was the real Prowl without Blaster's ping through the open commline. There was something extremely Prowl about him.

A shock ran through his engine as it hit him that he knew that. It was easy to pick out Prowl #3 because Bluestreak acted wrong. Wrong, as in not according to what Smokescreen expected from the mech they were imitating. He'd had a long, long time to adjust to how everyone looked and acted around him. It was background social knowledge built up vorn by vorn. The accumulated knowledge was filed away in his mind to be used when mingling in the common room or passing in the halls.

What sputtered his engine was realizing that he knew how Prowl acted around him. He could pinpoint when Bluestreak got the act right, just like he could tell how bad Prowl's Bluestreak façade failed. There was something Prowl he recognized as right.

The shock struck him because it had never occurred to him to analyze what Prowl actually did. He'd been comparing everything to that baseline without looking at what the baseline was. Everything had been there all along. He'd never brought it out to analyze.

He knew exactly how Prowl looked at him. Looked at him, acted around him, stopped at his table and spoke with him whenever the tactician came in when he was there. Which he usually did, if only to collect his energon ration or lecture whoever had caused trouble last. That was unusual, wasn't it? That Smokescreen saw the workaholic Second-in-Command so often? Or was it merely coincidence upon coincidence?

Now that he was thinking about it, Prowl's behavior around him set off shrill alarms in the back of his head. Oh. The baseline that'd built up over the course of the war had gradually become something that he'd never compared to anyone else's behavior. Because…because it was Prowl, basically. Prowl got special exemptions for a lot of strange behavioral ticks. It came from his rank, from that battle computer all his thoughts cycled through, and even from Smokescreen's own position outside of Prowl's chain of command. Wild cards could be assets or nightmares for tacticians, but either way, they bore close watch.

How Prowl watched him hadn't, until this very moment, struck Smokescreen as odd.

An uneasy tide rose in his chest as his self-not-self across the common room noticed both he and Ironhide looking at him. Prowl's optics flickered, and the tactician slowed. A brief hesitation, and then his path veered off toward Jazz's table.

Whoa, now Smokescreen knew there was something up. Jazz's table was the gathering place of Special Operations and its game of Monopoly.

SpecOps played to win, and they played dirty. The current edition of the boardgame had been running for half a year, even under the revised rules laid down by Optimus Prime in an attempt to cut off the corruption and trickery. The rules hadn't worked, possibly because of suspected bribery of the Prime by a certain former noblemech. The game had spawned politics, blackmail, covert operations to steal tiny plastic hotels, a wholly sadistic new deck of cards, and forgery of fake paper money. There was an entire government in place behind the taxes, jail, and railroads. The politicians running it were the winners from the last game.

The tangled web of economics and politics evolved in that game required a lawyer to navigate. Only possession of property or money moved a mech up in the political system. A stronger economic status equaled political power.

"This is why you won't be in charge of designing Cybertron's new government, I'll have you know," Bumblebee had told Mirage more than once, usually while the blue spy was raking in fake money by the handful.

"Says the Railroad Tycoon."

"Bow before the Astroforce!"

Normally, Prowl avoided the SpecOp's unofficial table like Cosmic Rust anytime the game was out. They kept trying to recruit him. Mirage claimed there was a proviso in the rules that drafted the Datsun to his team, but Jazz swore he'd get the Prime in his corner if Prowl joined.

Hence the reason for Prowl's decision to stay away. The last thing anyone needed was tabletop warfare between the officers.

Yet there he went. Jazz's visor widened, and his elbow slid down the table as he tipped over to see around Prowl's doors. Baffled blue glass asked a silent question. Smokescreen and Ironhide shrugged back, as confused as he was. The tactician causing their consternation glued on an unconvincing Bluestreak-style smile and opened his mouth to start a stilted attempt at the chatter.

The Decepticons timed their attack perfectly. "Alert! Alert! Autobots, assemble!" blared through the Ark's P.A. system. "Decepticons spotted in Idaho!"

The room groaned in unison. Prowl, however, seemed to offer a quick thanks to Primus as his mouth snapped shut. That garnered curious looks from the SpecOps mechs as they shut down the game for next time. They'd already been interested in what was going on, but his obvious relief tipped the balance; now they just had to know. The Datsun turned and hurriedly strode from the room, and gleeful grins chased at his heels.

Ooo, a mystery. Agents loved mysteries. It meant good gossip. Flee, Prowl, flee. Their nosiness would not be so easily escaped.

In the meantime, the other Autobots grumbled toward battle-ready. "What's in Idaho that the Decepticons could want?"

"Maybe Megatron built a potato gun."

Autobots paused halfway out of their seats to picture that.

"…anyone wanna bet on it?"

"You're on."

Smokescreen held his doors out straight in his best authoritative posture as he got up and headed out a step ahead of Ironhide. The other Autobots deferred to his familiar shape on reflex, which at least reminded him that now was not the time to be worrying about Prowl. That could wait. His questions could wait. Tomorrow would come soon enough.

It was time for the plan to go into effect. Here and now, Smokescreen was Prowl the Third and nobody else. Everyone would treat him like Prowl, because Smokescreen didn't exist. Three Prowls on the battlefield, three Prowls giving orders - as relayed from Prowl #1 by Blaster - and three Prowls with sniper rifles. The confusion should wreck merry havoc among the Decepticons even before Jazz went over to chat with their Air Commander.

Starscream was about to have a very bad day.

[* * * * *]

[ A/N:Thank you for your patience, Displacednoble!]