Chapter Text
Jazz of Staniz was a mech of culture.
Even back then his spark hungered after the cultures of every Cybertronian city-state littered on the planet to the point it was considered unorthodox.
Unnatural.
Against the laws of creation.
Against the dictated “Will of Primus” published by the Senate at the start of the Functionalist Era to compartmentalize bots into small little boxes and call it “Order.”
He didn’t heed ‘em words! Primus made it clear HE destined him for something more than being a service bot caterin’ to higher-caste mechs, Jazz could tell. An’ it was made even clearer when the first thing he did after gettin’ kicked out of his Service function was pack his subspace and become a nomad. A nomad-slash-assassin-slash-bard that would make the Role-Makers lose their slag.
This un/natural curiosity drew him into every nook and cranny like a radio’s song. From Kaon’s gritty underground rings brimming with manic energy to the floating towers of Vos, in the complex archives of Golden Iacon to the Brutalist architecture of Praxus city-states, Jazz absorbed everything like indium.
A very charming indium that led to meeting all kinds of characters— a Towers-mech Mirage. Transport-Bot Hound. Fellow bots who broke through the mold and made their own mech.
And a delivery bot named Orion Pax. Heh, the delivery bot in Optimus Prime ‘s still alive and humming with all the rousing speeches he delivers to uplift his team (Har har, very funny Jazz). Yeah, did he mention his energon buddy becomes a Prime? And a whole Civil War erupts and destroys Cybertron along with its cities and homes? The cultures lost and that can never be recovered?
The point Jazz is trying to make is that he loves learning something new. Whether it be spyin’ the new Decepticon energon route or wonderin’ how Skyfire walks through the doorways of the Ark, Jazz is the mech for “Learning and Adapting Quickly 101.” damn master at it!
Which is why after onlining on this planet Earth he hooked his processors onto this “World Wide Web” with the same vigour of learning how Prowl’s facial plates work. For any tells obviously! That’s his job as Spec Ops. Ya know, makin' files about his coworkers, the regular spy stuff. (He's not paranoid like Red Alert, but ya never know!)
Not like he's closer to the chilly Prowl than anyone else on this ship.
Not like he met Prowler way before the War when he was a wandering nomad-slash-something-slash-musician lookin’ stupid and lost at Crystal Park, Praxus. Tryin' to find the nearest pub to stay and play a jig with half a map he snagged off a tourist.
Not like the same tactician he verbally (friendly) sparred with was the same cop who kindly (coldly) showed Jazz around to make sure he did not confuse Building A with Building B. (Did not help that Praxian buildings all looked the same.)
The same cop who dragged a buzzed Jazz from a brawl that occurred a joor after. It's not like that was Prowl, right? Just because they had the same Cold-Construct frame- that's considered rude!
(Something Smokescreen lined out about CC's when Praxus fell an’ they were bringing in refugees. An’ when one of 'em was an Enforcer with a blacked-out optic and holding a tight servo on a weeping red-and-black youngster, well.)
Besides, it's not like Prowl would remember another bumbling idiot in a sea of dullards. Especially when that bumbling idiot conked out right before hitting the Enforcer Station.
(Good thing he scanned the Enforcer's ID who helped him walk straight, aimin' to thank him before he blacked out.)
(And hey! He compared ID's with the Enforcer of back then and the Tactician now— they were the same mech! Jazz was always awesome.)
"Jazz, respectfully, you've been talking about Prowl even before we went into stasis. Are you sure you're not what those humans call a 'yearner?'"
Jazz always thanked Primus for forgin' Mirage— without him the saboteur would be in the scrap heap a hundred times over by now. But after meticulously lining out his plan (with a hundred side-tracks and stories that do not connect), he wanted to smack the back of Mirage's helm upside. Really?? The audacity!! After pouring out his spark!!
It was half a year since the Autobots awoke from stasis, finding themselves in the city-state (country, they call it here) of the United States of America. Mount St. Hilary 's what they call the rock formation the Ark snugly resides in. Portland, State Oregon 's the part of America they're at. Jazz salutes the humans' version of the CyberNet, Google, for this information.
The two were camped outside of the Ark, the cycle- day ahead lookin' calm. Though no one comments out loud on it ‘cuz there's this stupid belief that if anymech says "it's rather calm today!" somethin’ happens. Like the Decepticons exploding a nearby gas station, or the alarm blaring mid-energon break. Either way, no one risks it.
Spec Ops Jazz gasps dramatically. "Mirage! Usin' human slang already? I-I'm so proud!" A loud sniff. Mirage rolls his eyes as he exhales in his fancy way.
"With the amount of times you've used slang, it's inevitable others will use it." The agent silently shuddered at the comments he read about a movie of blue aliens. When he found out what they meant-! Such... uncouth... language..! Creative… but uncouth nonetheless.
"So your plan is to use pick-up lines on the one mech who is the least likely to use, much less understand the slang you're saying?" A shake of a helm. For the 5328476th time since he left (was banished) from the Towers, Mirage wondered if Jazz was right in the processor.
Jazz grinned, and for the 5328476th time confirmed Mirage’s suspicions.
"After all I learned I can't get rid of the habit, mech. Bear with me! I'm willing to shoot my shot on him."
"...You're hopeless. Shen Wei, save him from yearning longer than you have."
"Who's Shen Wei? Anyway, I'll try it out on Prowl later— a little birdie told me some humans came over with some gifts to thank us for savin’ another gas station. Prowl’s prolly occupied."
The door of the Ark slides open and three familiar mechs walk out—the swag of the Terror Twins and a chattering Bluestreak tagging along like always. The Praxian excitedly waved at Mirage and Jazz when he spotted them perched on the rocky outcrop talking about spy-ey stuff. So cool!
His chipper voice filled the air. "Hey guys! It sure is a calm day today!"
And before Sideswipe clamped a servo on Bluestreak the alarm blared out and Red Alert's voice screeched over the microphones.
“ATTENTION AUTOBOTS!! DECEPTICON ACTIVITY SPOTTED NEARBY!! I REPEAT-!!”
A couple of groans filled the air (Sunstreaker, Sideswipe, Mirage), a flurry of apologies (Bluestreak), and a musical chuckle from Jazz. The spy jumped to his pedes and grinned at the mechs.
"Well fellas, time to get this show on the road!"
He'll pull out his arsenal on Prowl later. Right now, he's got some birds to shoot.
(Mirage: What birds?!)
Earth culture was everything and nothing like Cybertron.
Compared to Cybertronians, humans got slang that changes every twenny-something years, making Jazz mourn the stuff he missed out on when he was in stasis. Meanwhile the jokes and humor of Cybertron stick around for waaayy longer than that. Don’t help that a "year" for Cybertronians is different for humans. An’ don't get him started on the colorful and wonderful world of food ("Ya haven't tried mercury? Like, at all??), dance, and music! And this is just in Oregon! One of these days, Jazz will take up his adventurer shtick again to see more of this planet. But he's getting off-track here.
The sports.
Cybertron and its city-states had plenty to offer, each of 'em havin’ somethin’ special. Like Vos and their Kick-Offs, where flight frames used their pedes to kick and pass a ball onto a goal in the air (too bad Jazz was a grounder), or Iacon with their awesome altmode races. Little Staniz with their Battle of the Bands, and Kaon had something to offer aside from gruesome arenas— public debates. Hey, it counted as a sport even if the Senate dubbed oratory as a High Caste Only thing. What's one more illegal thing in Kaon, yeah?
Before the friendly humans left, one of 'em— Jackson was his des? —invited over some of the bots to a game. Somethin’ called basketball? Of course Jazz looked up some holovids online and it sure looked like a sport he coul’ do!
(Definitely ain’t no need to set himself on fire like with Nyon Wresting)
(Ratchet hated the sport with a passion.)
(And even more so when some hotshot Hot Rod enlisted and started demonstratin’ the sport. Not everyone was nonflammable like the Nyoni!)
Which brings us to the saboteur posted up right in front of Prowl's hab with a mission.
Jazz leaned against the entrance with all the suave and charm of a Gatsby, flashing the shiny smile of a mech who aimed to shoot his shot, and shoot it good. A three-pointer, a dream shake, a euro step, a slaggin' slam-dunk breakin' backboards left an' right.
He was gonna make it rain, and make it rain hard!
"Hey-a Prowler, you gotta nice rack today."
The Praxian turned to the spy, wings flicking in greeting. "Why thank you, Jazz. It's custom-made."
And behind the mech, blocked by Prowl's wings, were some crystals lined on a shiny, brand new rack. Stacked neatly (number and color coded) were some data pads, holo-pics of his brothers, and… yeah, it really did look custom-made. Prolly a gift from the humans earlier.
Jazz of Staniz, Chief of Spec Ops, Master Saboteur of the Autobot Army, felt the ball bounce off the ring and fall splat on the court. Deflated. Exploded. A pitiful excuse of rubber. Instead of breakin' backboards he was breaking the hearts of all goats past and present before him. He could hear Mirage sigh in the back of his processor and maybe Michael Jordan tearing up at that insane airball.
This was gonna be harder than he thought.
But Jazz was quick at recovering from a missed beat, or an tune quite off. So he grinned and quickly recovered like the awesome musician he is.
"Ya know, those humans wan' us to join 'em in watchin' a basketball game. Wanna come?" So suave. So chill. So nonchalant.
(Please, please, pleaaseeeeee...)
Prowl looked over the pile of datapads on his desk, and back at Jazz. As if that's a good enough answer. A frown on that sharp, chiseled, handsome, beautiful, strut-melting face, and Jazz woulda swooned on the spot if he wasn’t keeping up his charming aura.
"Blue's comin' too ya know, and he's plannin' on having you come with."
"..."
" I'm jus’ the calm before the storm. Knowin' that bit, he's gonna yam yer ear off to get ya to come."
"...Jazz, I don't have ears.”
Another prime (heh) example of what he's boutta face if Jazz keeps this up. But Jazz, the mech he is, enjoys a challenge.
Needless to say, he managed to convince the tactician to come over and watch a match (definitely did not use the “if Ratchet finds out ya ain’t takin’ breaks” card). Wow! If only his slang worked too, but good things take time.
When the saboteur left Prowl's habsuite into the empty hallway he felt the flicker of an amused EMF to his left. The air shifted into the form of Mirage giving him an I told you look. Jazz only grinned back, but sharper than before.
"The game’s just begun, ‘Raj.”
“Whatever, sir.”