Chapter Text
It’s been five orn, and he’s very, very sure that Jazz is Meister.
Or Meister is Jazz - all of his observations haven’t been enough to determine which is the true personality, and which the disguise. Jazz has an innocence about him, visor bright, steps light, that seems at odds not just with Meister but with all of Praxus - a friendly, casual demeanor that forgets to watch the shadows, that smiles too easily at monsters.
It is, as far as Prowl can tell, the most compelling evidence that he’s guessed correctly: if Jazz wasn’t Meister, he’d be dead.
Jazz hasn’t seemed to notice his observation. Prowl hopes that it’s because of his subtlety - a daily cube at Apophyllite’s across the street from where he performs, the occasional stroll through the crystal gardens behind him. It’s risky - no enforcer should develop habits - but so far, Meister hasn’t moved on or shown up in his washracks and told him to stop, so either he hasn’t been noticed, or the assassin doesn’t care if he knows.
If Prowl is honest with himself, there’s no reason for Meister to care. He has no intentions of using the knowledge against him - he has no intentions of turning the other mech in.
He had no intentions of contacting the mech at all, until today.
A timer ticks down at the edge of his HUD. Eighteen joor.
He plans his approach carefully, from his spot at the window - not bothering to glance out. He has enough of a map of the neighborhood stored, running through each new iteration of a plan in his ATS, discarding, and moving to the next one. It’s more meditative than anything - calming his shattered nerves.
He is very, very afraid.
Memories of the mechs at his door, the pounding - hulking figures, pushing past him, making themselves at home in his apartment, shoving him back into his own chair as they informed him, in no uncertain terms, that his informant - Jasper - was very caught, and that, if Prowl didn’t make suitable amends to their boss, he would be very dead. Just business. Madame Rhodolite sends her regards, officer. How much do you value your mech?
Too much, maybe. Jasper is a guttersnipe, no one important. He’s given Prowl tidbits, little snippets of information, nothing major. Any officer would tell him to cut and run, that Jasper burned himself, getting caught.
And Prowl can’t afford to give Rhodolite what she’ll want in return for Jasper’s life.
But… he can’t afford not to. He’s spent so long working alone, and Jasper’s help… it means more to him than it should, even if the cheerful younger mech has just been feeding him gossip. The thought of leaving him, of letting him get smelted for trying to make a difference…
And now he’s here, at his booth. Jazz - Meister - is right across the street, voice just loud enough to filter through the buzz of the cafe, and Prowl is planning something reckless.
He finishes his drink, leaves a cred chip on the table for his drink, and strides out into the sunlight. He crosses the street casually, moving over to the performer, and Jazz doesn’t even look up - no one looks at him, just an enforcer on the street, no one worth starting trouble with. As the singer continues, he focuses inward, carefully disarming his ATS as he does - the computer will do nothing but distract him, here, too inflexible for what he will need to do to speak to Jazz. He waits until the musician finishes the song, the few listeners wandering off -
And knocks his bucket over with his pede.
Jazz’s attention shoots to him, visor bright, but the sight of enforcer markings as he flairs his doorwings makes the singer’s plating flatten with fear. He steps back, nervous, hands going up in automatic submission, and his voice is soft and frightened when he speaks.
“Can I help you, officer?”
Prowl desperately hopes he has the right mech.
He steps forward, wings wide, radiating authority, and grabs the smaller mech by the wrist before he can run. “Your license to perform here is expired, Polyhex. I’m going to need you to accompany me to the station.”
No one is looking at them, now. In fact, everyone is very deliberately not looking at them. He can feel it against his doorwings, sensors alight with the attention of all the mechs not looking at what’s happening, desperately trying to avoid an officer shaking down one of the mechs making their living on the street.
No one wants to be next.
It rackles, but he plays the part - bending, scooping cred chips into the bucket and subspacing it. He doesn’t let go his grip on Jazz, and the performer doesn’t protest, cringing back but not resisting, not arguing. He and Prowl both know that he has another six vorn on the permit. He’s wise enough to know no one will care.
Prowl pulls out a stasis clamp, clipping it to the other mech’s back with a practiced gesture. “Transform, and follow me. You won’t like what happens if I have to use that.” It’s not what he should be saying - he should be reading Jazz his rights, should be letting him contact someone to meet them at the precinct - but it’s what is expected. He can’t be Prowl, right now - if this is to work, he needs to be another faceless, lawless cop, and faceless cops threaten.
Jazz doesn’t protest - he drops obediently into vehicle mode behind Prowl, following at a close but respectful distance as he’s led out to the highway. Prowl isn’t worried he’ll run - the stasis clamp he’s used is strong enough to take down a convoy - but the silence from the other mech is enough to cast shards of doubt across his meta. Jazz is very much acting like a frightened, innocent civilian, terrified of an officer who’s decided to take advantage of his rank.
By the time they reach the exit, he knows, one way or the other, that Prowl isn’t taking him to the precinct. They draw up at a light, and Prowl can feel the fear in his field, the hot tension as Prowl takes him down onto the more isolated substreets. There’s nowhere to run, down here. Not a good place for anyone who doesn’t call it home.
He turns down another street, Jazz still close enough to brush against his field, and slow to a stop in front of a factory. Abandoned, as it has been since he was brought here the first time. Leased out to a company that has no history, no ties. Roomy, with no one to come looking when a mech screams.
Jazz’s field doesn’t teek recognition as Prowl transforms.
He unholsters his gun before stepping away from the street. It doesn’t take training to tell him that turning his back, here, on the other mech might be fatal - but leaving them both exposed is risky, too, especially if Jazz is just an innocent musician.
He pushes reassurance into his own field, for the first time extending it towards the other mech, who hesitates for a moment before transforming - taking up a position a respectful distance away, not meeting his optics. The fear in his field is biting, an accusation, an indictment even if that’s not what Jazz intends - but Prowl wrestles down the beast inside him that rages that no citizen should ever have to fear him like this, and turns to hack the door.
There’s a second click, loud and dull like the lock of a stasis clamp, as it clicks open, and Prowl stiffens at the whir of another transformation sequence behind him. He doesn’t move as it finishes, letting the gun slip from his fingers, and doesn’t flinch when the blade slips between his shoulderplates to rest, threateningly, against a line.
“Meister.”
“Prowl.”
The assassin’s voice is low, angry - rumbling with threat - but Prowl isn’t dead yet. It’s a victory he’ll take, for now. “I needed to talk to you. No one knows where I am. I haven’t told anyone about this place.”
Meister is silent. The knife remains where it is, threat clear, but Meister hasn’t killed him yet, and that, too, is a victory.
“Inside.”
He lets his hands rise as he moves, telegraphing his obedience to the other mech as he slides through the door, slowly enough that Meister can follow without ever letting the knife slip from between his shoulders. The door slips shut with a click behind the assassin, who locks it with a few taps on the pad, and Prowl feels a buzz wash over him as he enters the range of the building’s comms disruptor. He stands patiently, waiting for Meister to speak, as the knife pulls away, and Meister circles to stand in front of him, dentae bared in a snarl.
White fire bursts in a roar across his sensors as the assassin backhands him to the floor.
It’s not wholly unanticipated. Prowl knows he’s playing with fire, knew before he ever approached the assassin that this was dangerous, risky - but it startles him nonetheless, the sudden, furious violence of it. He scrambles back, pushing himself to a crouch - but Meister doesn’t let up, kicking hard enough to knock him off balance, grabbing him by a wing and his collar and throwing him with frightening strength to skid across the floor, away from any wall he might try to get his back to - it’s obvious the assassin doesn’t intend to give him the chance to fight back.
Meister is on him again before he can stand, silent as ever, radiating fury, slamming him chest-first against the floor. Prowl feels a burst of panic bubble up - his wings are right there, exposed - but Meister ignores them, the only mercy he shows as he lifts Prowl’s helm to slam him again, and Prowl feels an lens crack in one of his optics, vision going half-blurred -
And then he’s done, the attack seemingly over as quick as it began. Meister’s full weight presses down on his back, grinding him into the tiles as the assassin pins him. Prowl doesn’t fight, doesn’t try to struggle as a hand presses his helm to the ground, going as limp as he can.
He can feel the faint shake of Meister’s frame as the other mech vents, fans silently churning off heat - the tension as the assassin waits for him to resist, for some sign that Prowl intends to make this a struggle. Prowl is careful not to give it to him, staying still as the other mech’s vents cool, grip slowly relaxing, until at last the assassin slowly, warily, rises off of him.
Prowl waits half a click before lifting his helm. When Meister snarls, he stills again, and speaks.
“Please. I just want to talk. I have no intention of betraying you - no one else knows who you are. No one is going to look for you here.”
“Then no one will find you.” Meister’s voice has a cold chill to it, one that it’s never held before. He circles, footsteps silent. “I should slit your throat and dump you. What gave me away?”
Prowl keeps an even tone, flattens the tremble from his wings as best he can. Without the ATS, it’s harder to keep calm, with Meister stalking him like this. The only relief he has is that his wings, uninjured and unbaffled, can track the assassin as he moves, the faint rippling air of his passage.
“You have some of the same kibble. The same visor. Polyhexians aren’t common in Praxus. And you have the same mods.” He hesitates. “Not the magnets. When you packed up your instruments. I could hear you moving, but your vents - your engine - were silent.”
Meister gives a low growl of frustration.
“I’ve known for weeks. I… went looking, after we met that second time. I didn’t expect to find you. If I was going to tell someone, I would have.”
“So it’s blackmail, then?” The assassin half-snarls it. “I do your dirty work, and you let me keep my happy little life? I wouldn’t have expected it from you, officer. Mighta thought you were better than that. Who did you want me to kill, mech?”
The thought makes Prowl’s doorwings flair with shock, and Meister steps back, flaring his own plating aggressively in return. “No, nothing like -” He hadn’t even thought of it, almost regrets not thinking of it, except he can’t imagine attacking Meister like that, not after the mech had saved his life, spared his life - “I’m sorry. I didn’t come here to threaten you - I won’t tell anyone, I swear. You have my word. I just… I need help.”
Meister stills, out of sight: listening, quiet, angry.
“Please, Meister, I’m sorry. Just.. hear me out.” Prowl slides carefully to his knees, raising his hands slowly, palms out and open - once they’re above his shoulders, he bares his wings. Makes himself defenseless - unable to lash out. Meister doesn’t stop him. “I - I need help. I had nowhere else to go.”
“So you decided to rat me?” Meister’s voice is a snarl, even though his engines are silent as ever. “I ain’t - I’m not a plaything, cop! I helped you one time - but I ain’t here to be used!”
“You came to me, last time!” Prowl only raises his voice a little, but it’s enough to make Meister pause, and he rushes on. “You came to me, and asked me to step back from my case, and I did. And you killed my suspect - killed a lot of mechs, and even without you I had him - I could have had him an orn earlier if I had kept working!”
“You would have got killed, mech -”
“You said you wanted me alive to do good in this city!” Prowl might be yelling, now. He’s angry enough to, at Meister, at his stubbornness, at Praxus. Angry at himself. “You said you wanted to see some justice! Well I’m trying - I’ve been trying - but I can’t do it alone!”
His voice cracks on the word, and Meister steps back, plating flattening defensively, as if bracing for an attack. But Prowl doesn’t move, even as his engine snarls and his vents heave with heat.
“I can’t do it alone. I never could, but now there’s a good mech who’s going to die tonight because I can’t, and I need -” He chokes on it, on the look on Meister’s face and the other mech’s anger, on the sudden surge of loneliness. It’s too much, and he knows, with sudden, crushing surety, that Meister isn’t going to help him, that the other mech is going to laugh and turn him away if he isn’t killed for the presumption, and Jasper is going to die tonight.
Despair makes his wings sag, and he lowers his hands - as if the assassin needs the assurance; he’d be dead before he could reach for a weapon. Bows his helm, offlines his optics - makes his field submissive. Begs. He owes his informant that much, at least. “I need help. Please. Whatever favors you want - whatever you need done, I’ll do it, just please, please help me.”
He doesn’t look up at Meister. Doesn’t want to see the anger on the other mech’s face, or the rejection - doesn’t want Meister to see the tears he can feel welling at the edges of his optics. Then, suddenly, there’s a gentle hand cupping his cheek, raising his helm - and as he onlines his optics, a thumb gently brushes them away.
Meister is crouched before him, expression oddly flat, visor almost white-bright. Nothing about him - not his expression, not his field, not his pose - is enough to betray his thoughts. It’s too much, and Prowl tries to look away, but Meister’s gaze and the smooth touch on his cheek has him pinned - fixed in place far more firmly than any cuffs, even as his spark roils in his chest.
“Alright.”
Meister’s voice is soft, like he’s talking to a frightened mechanimal - it hardly registers, at first, doesn’t pierce through the veil of despair blanketing Prowl. But he repeats the word, again, and all the anger is gone from his tone, and Prowl feels suddenly exhausted, too tired for hope.
He follows, helplessly, when Meister rises, a hand on his shoulder steadying him when he staggers - lets the assassin guide him to the berth in the corner, seat him there. He feels numb, frozen, like he’s standing on the precipice of a crash - but there’s no crash building, just the cold static in his chest and the world narrowing around him.
There’s a dim awareness - Meister is speaking, saying something to him - but the words don’t process. Meister is watching him, speaks again, but Prowl can’t respond - there’s static all around him, and the darkened warehouse is too bright, everything growing hazy and dissolute -
Meister is touching him. Meister has - something, a thermal blanket - Meister is wrapping it around him, covering him, and Prowl can’t move to protest or free his doorwings, but Meister doesn’t pull it too tight, and the gentle pressure on his sensors is almost grounding, it doesn’t hurt -
And then a field blooms around him, and Prowl latches on before he can even realize that it’s Meister’s field. Warmth, and compassion, and concern, and safety, pushed against him like a promise, and there’s nothing he can do but reach out with his own numb field and drench himself in it. And - Meister lets him, and draws him in, and distantly, Prowl realizes that he’s being held, that Meister is sitting next to him and holding him close, arms around his waist and across his chest, and that he’s sobbing in the assassin’s arms -
“It’s alright, Prowl. Come back ta me. You’re safe. I ain’t gonna hurt you any more.”
Pressure that Prowl hadn’t even registered pours out of him like a tide, and he’s empty inside, suddenly left hollow and shaking, still sobbing, and he tries to curl away from Meister’s touch, but the other mech only pulls him closer, until he’s half-sprawled in the other mech’s lap, curled against his chest, and Meister is gently stroking his helm. Humiliation drenches him, spiking jaggedly across his field, and he has to get away - but Meister’s field is far more controlled, and the assassin floods it with - with kindness, and concern, and respect, as if Prowl hasn’t just broken in front of him, as if he hasn’t been fatally, cripplingly weak -
“It’s alright, Prowl. Let it out. You’re gonna be alright.”
Meister’s voice is calm, and not mocking, and an anchor, and Prowl clings to it, desperate.
The assassin doesn’t stop speaking, and the words wash over him, nothing that needs to be remembered, processed, analyzed - just constant, softly-spoken reassurances. Meister just keeps talking, and Prowl feels his field settling, the world blossoming back open around him, the static frost of panic receding back down his wings.
Meister pauses, for a moment. Then:
“You back with me, Prowl?”
Prowl squeezes his optics shut, and nods. “I’m - I’m sorry, I don’t know -”
Meister shushes him, gently, and Prowl cuts off with a choke. “You panicked, Prowl. It’s alright. Ain’t the first time I’ve seen it. Nothing you could’ve done about it, once it started. Nothing to be ashamed of.” Meister hums softly. “I’d’a thought you’d crash, first. Glad you didn’t.”
“I…” he hesitates. He doesn’t want to admit the weakness, not to the assassin still holding him close, but Meister… Meister hasn’t killed him yet, and Prowl… he’s out of options. He needs - to trust somebody, anybody, even if it’s Meister. “I shut off my ATS. Before we arrived. My - my tactical suite. I… I didn’t want it distracting me.”
The assassin shifts under him, and Prowl can feel the considering look, even if he can’t see it. “It makes you crash?” There’s no judgement in the question - just curiosity.
“If I… If I’m not ready, then adding in a… conflicting variable… can crash it.” He shouldn’t be saying it - realizes even as the words come out how dangerous the weapon he’s just handed to Meister is - but he can’t stop himself. “It’s very painful.”
Meister seems to be considering that, silent, all around him, and Prowl feels more words rise up even as he tries to resist saying them, realizing that they’re the exact wrong thing to say, that it’s the stupidest thing he could say right now - “Please don’t make me crash.” It comes out quiet, pleading, like he’s a sparkling timidly requesting something, and he hates it, but Jazz’s voice isn’t teasing or unkind when he responds.
“I won’t, mech. Wouldn’t do that to you.” His field is warm, and sincere, and Prowl, recklessly, believes him.
Meister sits with him for another click, then two, as Prowl can feel his stressed processes spinning down, his frame calming. It’s only once he’s mastered his field, stilling it enough to draw close, that the assassin speaks again.
“Your agent - your mech. You needed help?” Meister slips out from under him, tucking the thermal blanket back around him as he does, leaving Prowl to sit on the berth as Meister slides into a chair, dragging it closer. He offers a wrist, and it takes Prowl a moment to realize what he wants, processor still sluggish. “Show me.”
It goes against all his training - it’s not safe - but if Meister wanted to hack him, he’s had more than enough chances. Prowl unspools a data cable, wordlessly offering it to the other mech to plug in. He’s more surprised when one is proffered back, the thin black offer of a mutual connection. It’s enough to make him glance up - but Meister just smiles.
He clicks it into place, and awareness floods through him.
Meister is inside him - a sleek, dark presence, sliding against his meta like a knife. The assassin is vast, and dangerous: his code screams warnings, firewalls singing with the threat, but Meister doesn’t try to breach them - doesn’t even test them, instead waiting, looming, in the meta, letting Prowl bring forward whatever he wants the other mech to see.
He is inside Meister - a glitched line of code, jagged and rough in the other’s meta. He feels the other mech’s firewalls, a smooth black wall before him, and holds himself back as best he can from even brushing against them, doing anything to prompt retaliation. This isn’t his first time crossing cables: Prowl knows that he is damaged, that the presence of his processes in another’s meta is unpleasant.
He retreats into his own mind, as much as he can, and drags forward the files. Jasper’s final, frantic message. The video of the attack. Stills of Jasper broken, leaking. Rhodolite’s threat, Jasper’s yellow frame slumped behind him.
Meister watches it all, impassive. Doesn’t even flinch at the beating, when Rhodolite’s man smashes in the minibot’s windshield, scattering glass across the street - doesn’t so much as twitch when the video cuts to Jasper bound, in front of a smelter, optics dim and terrified, throat savaged, and Prowl feels another surge of terror that it’s not enough, that Meister will turn him away -
But the assassin senses it, bound up in the meta as he is, and Prowl can feel it when his attention shifts. :I have you, Prowl. It’s alright. We’ll get him back.:: Sudden awareness blossoms, as Prowl reads the truth in Meister’s meta - he’s seen worse, done worse, this isn’t enough to shake him like it has Prowl, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t care.
::Rhodolite’s messenger said she was going to do it tonight. That they’d stream it - make me watch.:: He draws up the video, the messenger’s face lit by the predawn streetlights. ::It fits her usual patterns - she likes to wait, to give mechs the time to present an appeal.::
::I know.:: Meister brushes against his firewalls, not testing - a comforting gesture. ::I’ve crossed paths with her before. Nasty mech - but there’s always been a bigger fish.::
He offers memories of his own - a snarled confrontation between the jewel-red femme and a blue mech that Prowl recognizes vaguely as Cabachon. A heated encounter between her and a green mech, one that ends in a vicious, bare-handed beating. A pale grey mech on his knees, hands bound, begging, before he’s shot in the spark.
Prowl almost shudders at the thought of what’s being done to Jasper.
::She’ll leave him intact.:: Meister’s words are cold comfort. ::She knows he’s got a mech looking out for him. You’re a useful tool for a mech in her position, Prowl. She won’t risk offlining him before she’s sure you won’t bargain for him.::
::There’s a lot you can do to a mech without offlining him.:: He knows, even as he says it, that he doesn’t need to tell the assassin that, but Meister only brushes comfort towards him again.
::I know.::