Spec Ops Mission 98: Jazz's Interrogation at Soundwave's Pedes

by KC

Summary: Surrounded by the torrid fiction of his fellow Autobots, Jazz uncovers a Decepticon plot hidden amidst their written fantasies. Can the Spec Ops commander turn this plot of high treason into a narrative...of love?

Pairing: Soundwave/Jazz (plus some Prowl/Jazz)

A thin ray of light spilled from the door as it creaked open. On the berth, Fireflight looked up with wide optics, pulling uselessly at the chain on his collar as he cringed against the wall. His whole chassis still ached from the last session. How much more punishment could the young flier take?

From the whip hanging in Starscream's hands, the Decepticon clearly had much more in store for Fireflight.

"Lord Megatron is busy with your friend Silverbolt," Starsceam said, his smile widening as Fireflight trembled. "So I'll take my pleasure and that sweet aft...before I make you part of my Decepticon armada."

"I'll never join you!" Fireflight yelled, turning his head. "I'm a proud Autobot! I'll never-"

His voice hitched as Starscream caught his face and forced him to look up, grabbing Fireflight's hand and putting it over his Decepticon mark.

"In a few orns," Starscream murmured, "you'll be begging for this sigil."

Fireflight whimpered as Starscream forcefully kissed him, a small squeak escaping as the Decepticon slipped his fingers across the soft cables of his hip joint-

The screen of his datapad came up to smack Bumblebee's face and he stumbled back, holding his faceplate. Someone put their hands on his shoulders, steadying him.

"Yo, 'Bee," Jazz said, "careful where you're walking, 'bot."

"Sorry," Bumblebee said, backing up as he rubbed where the datapad had hit. "I should've been looking."

A few chuckles answered him. Bumblebee vented in embarrassment under the optics of several of the officers and-Primus help him-Optimus all gathered just outside Prowl's office.

"No worries." Jazz looked down at the datapad, angling his visor trying to get a look at it. "What'cha reading that's got you so-?"

Bumblebee's optics went wide and he flipped off the datapad and hid it behind his back. "Nothing! Nothing important. Just reports."

His mouth quirking, Jazz stood straight, crossing his arms as he looked at Bumblebee. The smaller bot kept moving back as he spoke, waving his free hand.

"You don't have any reports to file," Jazz said, leaning forward and peering at him.

"So I'd better get writing some," Bumblebee said and kept edging back the way he'd came, glancing over his shoulder once. "I gotta get back to work-file this and get on monitor duty-"

Looking more concerned, Red Alert craned his neck to look over Prowl. "'Monitor duty'? You're not scheduled on that for half a quartex-"

"Oh geez," Bumblebee said with a sheepish grin. "I really better check the roster again. I can't believe I forgot."

"Bumblebee..." Jazz said, a warning in his voice.

"Sir yes sir, I'm right on it!" Bumblebee said in a rush, scooting around the corner so fast that he tripped over his own pedes. As he fell out of sight, there was the distinct sound of a transformation and then the thrum of an engine.

Optimus tilted his head. "Well, that wasn't suspicious at all."

Jazz sighed, holding up his hands in exasperation. "Ladies and gentle 'bots, I give you Spec Ops. Great at sneaking by enemies, not so much around their own officers."

Ironhide chuckled. "Leave the poor 'bot alone. We probably just spooked him. I remember being nervous around brass once upon a time."

"I don't believe you were ever less than gruff or conniving," Jazz said, rejoining the impromptu meeting. On his private channels, however, he send a quick message to Mirage and Smokescreen to find Bumblebee and sit on him until he could get there.

"You'll never forgive me for your promotion?" Ironhide smiled ruefully. "I'm hurt, Jazz. I'm really hurt."

Jazz gave him a look. Many vorns ago, Jazz had enjoyed the life of a simple spy. If he stole a few Decepticon cubes of spiked energon for personal use, he could expect a scolding and extra work. If he teamed up with Blaster to get the whole Spec-Ops division over-energized in the loudest after hours party this side of the galaxy, there would be a headache the next orn and a lecture from Ratchet as he repaired their clogged filters. He followed orders, ran his missions, and danced the stress away every night.

But then Ironhide had seen a greater need for Special Operations to become its own unit, and Jazz had been the natural choice. There had been some concern over his disciplinary record, but no matter how he protested, Jazz now enjoyed the commander's duties of all his previous work plus the added responsibility of staff meetings, training his team and organizing missions.

"Your rusty aft," Jazz said. "You will always owe me for that. All this responsibility can't be good for a mech."

"Nonsense," Prowl said. "If I had known promoting you would curb your worst tendencies, I would have done so a long time ago."

"Sure, sure," Jazz said, his grin coming back. After all this time, nothing relieved stress as much as making the Second in Command's life a little more interesting. "Well, sirs, if you all will excuse me, I'm afraid I actually do have reports to file, and I need to skedaddle before Prowl finds out what I left on his desk."

As Jazz took off with the same backward step Bumblebee had used, giving Prowl a jaunty salute, Red Alert put his arm in front of Prowl before the enforcer could take more than a step.

"Let him go," Red Alert said. "I need to cross-reference some things with you, and whatever he left, it's already on your desk."

"Jazz, you are Third in Command," Prowl said, sternly calling after him. "Act like it!"

"I'll see you later!" Jazz said, drowning out Prowl's grumbles as he rounded the corner. A moment later, a communication pinged on his internal com unit.

"Commander?"

"Go ahead, Mirage," Jazz said. A few mechs startled away as he ran past. "Tell me something good."

"I'm at the Tertiary Supply Depot," Mirage continued. "And I have Bumblebee here."

"There we go," Jazz said. "Nice knowing I got at least one mech who can sneak around successfully. You sitting on him like I said?"

"Um, no." Mirage hesitated, sharing what must have been shocked looks with Bumblebee. "I didn't think that was literal."

"Do it," Jazz ordered. "I haven't figured out yet what I'm gonna do to that little brat, and I don't want him spooking and tearing off before I get there."

Another channel opened up, broadcasting static for a moment before Bumblebee spoke up. A faint metallic clink came through, probably the smaller bot's habit of tapping his fingertips when he got nervous and couldn't shoot his stress away.

"Does he have to?" Bumblebee asked. "I'm not going anywhere, I promise, and Mirage might crush me."

"Hey," Mirage snapped. "I'll have you know my frame is refined, lightweight polymer."

"Quit moaning," Jazz said, ignoring the elevator in lieu of the stairs he could take three at a time. "I'm almost to your position. And Mirage, check him out for a datapad. If he's tapping his fingers, that means he ain't got it, and I want it."

Long silence followed, with a thin screech of static that vanished almost as soon as they uttered it. Jazz frowned. Not good. Not only was Mirage not sitting on Bumblebee nor frisking him, but his two operatives were conspiring together.

Jazz slowed, moving silently as he spotted the supply depot. The sliding door was easily as tall as Prime himself and almost as heavy, but luck was with him. Mirage hadn't closed the door after himself, and there was just enough space for Jazz to slip by noiselessly. His mechs weren't at the entrance, and he ghosted through the shelves of armaments, listening for their furtive whispers.

"Get rid of it," Mirage said in a rush. "Just throw it away."

"He knows I had it," Bumblebee argued, punching his datapad's keys audibly too hard. "I can't just hide it."

"Then delete it!"

"I'm trying!"

Jazz paused one shelf away, watching them between stacks of ammunition. Behind his visor, his optics narrowed to slits. Mirage and Bumblebee both hunched over the datapad, with the larger mech throwing furtive glances toward the door while Bumblebee repetitively pushed two buttons over and over. It would've been funny if these weren't two of his most highly trained agents.

"How many do you have on there?" Mirage asked, his voice rising in desperation. "Oh slag, if you have any of the commander's-"

"Lay off! I didn't even download those," Bumblebee said. "But it isn't just deleting them. He'll read the logs, and it takes awhile to upload a good deletion tool. I never thought I'd have to delete my own datapad."

Silent as a cat creeping up on canaries, Jazz stepped out from his cover and leaned against the steel shelves. After taking a few seconds to cross his arms and pedes dramatically, he vented his frustration in a sudden burst that had his mechs jerking straight and Bumblebee hiding the datapad behind his back.

"Which makes me wonder," Jazz said, punctuating each word with harsh, clipped consonants. "What are you trying to hide from me?"

"Commander," Bumblebee squeaked, then coughed in embarrassment and brought his voice back down an octave. "Um, sir, I-"

"Spec Ops," Jazz said over him. "The vanguard of the Autobots, the elite of the anti-Decepticon forces. The very best we have to offer."

Bumblebee's mouth clicked shut, and Mirage winced and turned his head, staring a hole into the floor.

"And inside one breem," Jazz continued, "one bumps into an officer's meeting, draws everyones' attention to something he's trying to hide, runs off like a new recruit, and then can't kill one datapad."

Neither bot spoke up, and Jazz took some measure of comfort that they weren't stupid enough to argue. He pushed off the shelf and walked towards them, giving Mirage a glare for good measure before focusing entirely on Bumblebee.

"It's a wonder the Decepticons haven't already won," Jazz said. "Maybe the only reason I still have mechs to yell at is 'cause Starscream keeps everyone so distracted that your noisy afts don't get shot. Damn, I ought to make him an honorary Spec Ops 'bot, 'cause Primus knows it ain't my mechs winning the war."

"Please, sir," Bumblebee tried, "there was a good reason."

"No," Mirage hissed at him.

"I swear," Jazz said, holding out his hand expectantly. "You and I better have the same idea of 'good'."

Bumblebee looked at him, his optics wide and shimmery under the light like a scolded puppy, and he held the obvious datapad behind his back a moment longer, wrestling with himself. Then Mirage nudged him hard enough to make him sway, and Bumblebee gave him a desperate look, probably begging on their own private intercom for a miraculous way out.

Jazz, Third in Command and most terrifying of all Autobots, almost lost it there, holding in his laugh only by keeping his vents shut tight. But scolding commanders couldn't afford to laugh at their troops, no matter how much they reminded said commander of his own early days. Instead he flashed his visor and lowered his head, focusing tightly on Bumblebee. The datapad was placed in his hand, and Bumblebee pressed one hand against his mouth.

"I haven't read all of them," he pleaded. "Just a couple. I would've told you eventually, I swear-"

Jazz tuned him out, glancing over the datapad and about to bring up the deletion logs. Flustered or not, Bumblebee was still a damn good Spec Ops bot, and he wanted to know what his little soldier had nearly managed to hide.

And then Jazz froze. Tilted his head and brought the screen up a little closer, blinking to make sure his optics weren't seeing things.

"Decepticon Slave-bots in the No-Escape Brothel," he whispered.

Mirage stared at Bumblebee. "You seriously downloaded that one?"

"You got no room to judge," Bumblebee huffed. "Mr. Morphobot Tentacles."

"That didn't include Decepticons," Mirage snapped, then paused. "Wait. Didn't the brothel one have...?"

They both looked at Jazz, then stared at the floor. And their commander took a moment to realize what they meant.

"Wait one sec," Jazz started, waving the datapad like a threat. "You don't seriously mean-"

"We didn't write any of those," Mirage insisted. "I swear!"

Not sure what to think, Jazz looked back at the datapad. I Fought Shockwave's Drone Dolls of Death. Pleasure Logs of Thrust's Insatiate Trine. Lamborghini Twins Do the Ark. The titles pulsed in his cortex like some vile organic breathing, and like staring at a disrupted mech, Jazz looked back in fascinated horror as he double tapped the title.

Fireflight moaned, fighting the coming overload and yet flushed with sickened satisfaction as Starscream whispered obscene praise in his audios.

"Such a strong willed little flier," the Decepticon hissed, running his glossa across the cables in Fireflight's exposed, vulnerable throat. "To resist me this long and still have the strength to stay conscious."

"I won't turn," Fireflight whimpered, driven to the edge of his limits. "You can't make me."

"Ah, but I already have," Starscream chuckled, "and as easily as I make you overload. Here, look at your new decoration, my sweet pet...my newest Decepticon!"

With a gasp, Fireflight looked past Starscream's laughing face to his own chest plating, his wail of pain matching the commander's glee, for there on his armor lay the purple mark of terror, branding him as property of his sworn enemy.

"And just so you realize," Starscream said, forcing still another hot kiss from Fireflight's sore lips, "the depths of your imprisonment, your next playmate shall be my greatest triumph-your Third in Command, broken to my will."

Jazz's head snapped up and locked both of his mechs in a cold, murderous glare.

"Explain. And fast."

TBC...