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wyntir_knightTitle: The Polyhex Candidate
Fandom: Transformers: Generation One
Characters & Relationships: Smokescreen, Mirage, Jazz, Prowl, Ratchet, Bumblebee, Optimus Prime, Ultra Magnus, Red Alert, Ironhide, Perceptor, Wheeljack.
Jazz/Prowl, Wheeljack/Ratchet/Perceptor, mentions of Smokescreen/Swindle, Jazz/Mirage, Jazz/Smokescreen.
Rating: R
Warnings: graphic violence, dub-con, attempted rape, implication of bondage, mentions of rape, mentions of torture, reprogramming, tactile, spark-sex, plug-and-play
Summary: A year ago Jazz was captured by the Decepticons and reprogrammed into a walking time-bomb. Now that he has returned to the Autobots his new programming has kicked in and he has left chaos in his wake. It's up to Smokescreen and Mirage to find Jazz and bring him back to their side and back to sanity before he is completely lost. Meanwhile Prowl and Ultra Magnus try to keep Iacon from destroying itself as panic grips the populace, and as Prowl fights for his sanity after a year's separation from his bonded and the sure knowledge that Jazz may not survive.
Link to the fic on A03 or read it below! Comments and critique are greatly appreciated!
Chapter 5
Smokescreen stalked the small boardroom like a caged animal. He and Mirage had set themselves up shortly after they had received their orders, but after a full night of research and vaguely hostile discussion they hadn’t come to any form of viable plan. And the Praxian was just about ready to walk away from the whole thing and take matters into his own hands.
“We should be doing something, ‘Raj! Sitting here plotting out potential angles isn’t going to help anyone!” Smokescreen railed.
“I already told you we need a plan before we run off half-cocked,” Mirage replied with the calm patience one reserved for a dull-witted sparkling. “And it’s Mirage. Not Raj. You don’t have the right to use such informalities with me.”
Smokescreen stopped his stalking of the room and brought his hands down heavily in the table causing the holomap to shiver and jump at the vibrations. “We have a plan. I have given you a perfectly viable plan, Mirage,” he sneered, putting far too much emphasis on the first syllable of the spy’s name. “All we’re doing is wasting time. Time that we should be spending finding Jazz. In the hours we’ve spent sitting here on our afts he could have been-”
“And you suggest we go about finding him by simply asking?” Mirage asked, interrupting the tirade. “And while we’re down in the slums asking every criminal and low-life if they’ve seen Jazz, what’s to stop them from telling the Decepticons? Or tipping off Jazz and forcing his hand?”
“Oh? And what do you suggest we do, Mirage? Continue researching all the possible places he could possibly be hiding and hope he stays put? That’s even assuming he’s still in Iacon!”
“He’s in one of our old safe houses,” the spy said, never looking up from the map he was examining.
“And how do you figure that?” Smokescreen asked.
“It’s what I’d do.”
Smokescreen looked at Mirage, incredulity written all over his face. “It’s what—Okay, fine. So you think he’s in a safe house. Which one? As I recall we had over a dozen in Iacon alone and those are the ones I knew about. I’m sure that you two kept things from me during my tenure with Special Ops. But let’s say for sake of argument that there are only the twelve; how do we even know that he’s still in Iacon? Primus knows if it was me I’d take the first opportunity to get as far away as possible. Especially since he probably thinks he’s killed Prime.”
“Yes, but you always did have the distressing habit of trying to leave before the job was fully done,” Mirage replied blandly.
“I most certainly did not!” Smokescreen snarled, doors pinning back in an uncharacteristic display of emotion. Unlike his fellow Praxians, Smokescreen had never had any difficulty keeping his expressive doors stock still.
“Of course you didn’t,” the former noblemech replied, never attempting to hide the sneer in his voice. “And you’re ignoring the key point. Jazz isn’t done yet. It makes no sense to take out Prime alone. He isn’t our only commander and Jazz made no attempt to destroy the Matrix. If he was compromised by the Decepticons, wouldn’t you think that their plan would involve more than just killing Optimus Prime?”
Smokescreen stepped back and resumed his pacing, though he moved slower than before. “I think you’re giving the ‘Cons too much credit. Besides, Prime’s death would be a huge blow to all of us. Yes, someone else could take over, but it wouldn’t change the fact that this would be the third Prime we’ve lost in recent memory and would be a huge blow to morale.”
“Morale can be lifted. Yes it would be a blow, but we've risen from worse,” Mirage replied dismissively. “No. Jazz is most certainly not done yet. He needs to take out Ultra Magnus first and then Prowl.”
Smokescreen stopped his pacing and pursed his lips thoughtfully as he ran over the new data.
“And then he needs to take you out too,” he said, looking pointedly at Mirage.
“How do you figure that one? Wishful thinking?”
Smokescreen snorted. “Hardly. Unlike some people, I don't tend to hold grudges against people who've done nothing wrong. No. My point is that he tried to take out Bumblebee and yet left Ironhide alone.”
“And yet he killed those security guards,” Mirage replied thoughtfully. “So you're suggesting that he specifically targeted Bumblebee? And the guards were simply in the way?”
“Exactly.” Smokescreen made no attempt to hide the smug tone. “Yes, Bee may have been in the wrong place at the wrong time, but so were all those medics and yet, Jazz never attacked them. Or should I say, never killed any of them. Plus, he never took anyone out on the way to getting Prime.”
The blue spy was silent for a long moment before nodding slowly. “You may have a point in that. But all that does is further cement the idea that Jazz will have remained in Iacon. He is nowhere near done with three targets left to take out.”
“Four,” Smokescreen replied.
“Three. Ultra Magnus, Prowl, and myself. You are no longer Special Ops.” A silent 'and you're no threat' hung in the air unsaid between them.
Smokescreen’s optics narrowed and for a brief moment seemed to flash an almost purple shade before he calmed, refusing to rise to Mirage’s baiting.
“Fine. Three,” he said tightly. “You know what? You keep going over those maps. I’m going to do some actual leg work on this.”
Without waiting for a response, Smokescreen turned and left the Special Operations office.
---
The streets of Iacon were practically buzzing with the controlled panic of a populace on the edge of hysteria. As Smokescreen walked among the other pedestrians’ whispers reached his audios.
“… the Prime’s dead …”
“I heard that it was a coup. That he was killed by his honour guard.”
“… Decepticons invaded the base! They killed everyone!”
“I’m telling you, Megatron has the Matrix! We’re all walking dead mechs!”
The conversations were all the same. All whispered in hushed voices as the mechs looked about surreptitiously desperately searching for proof among their fellows that the rumours were false, and yet at the same time there seemed an almost pathological need for the tales to be true. Anything would be better than the wash of nothing that they’d been receiving lately from the Autobots.
Smokescreen shook his head as he worked his way around a cluster of miners. This panic was only going to increase until it came to a complete boil and the Autobots would be facing a war on two fronts. The Decepticons at their gates and rioting civilians inside the walls. It was a situation he had seen far too many times in the past and every one of his instincts was telling him to run, to cut his losses and get while the going was still good. It’s what he and Swindle would have done back in the day.
At the thought of his former partner, his spark clenched painfully. It had been almost two full vorn since he and Swindle had gone their separate ways and since Smokescreen had joined the Autobots. But they had been together for far longer than that and the memories were still fresh and painful. Especially the memories of that last failed meeting and the resulting incarceration of the Combaticons. Perhaps things would have been easier if Swindle actually was dead rather than trapped in a Decepticon mind prison.
“They’re lying to us!”
“Yeah, but about what?”
Smokescreen pulled his attention away from his own old spark-ache and turned back to the matter at hand. The murmurs and the grumblings were becoming more specific as groups of mechs started to focus their fear and anger. He quietly moved to a nearby storefront and began to peruse the merchandise, blending in with the mid-afternoon crowds as he took in the surrounding conversations and mechs.
“The Autobots, obviously!” a large grey and tan mech said, irritation coursing off of him in palpable waves. “Regardless of what happened, they’re not telling us the truth, and if they’re lying about something as big as the Prime getting offed, what else are they keeping from us?”
Smokescreen focused his attention on this new mech. He was large, both broad and tall and he had the look of a deep surface miner. But there was something wrong with him, something about the whole situation that set the Praxian’s doors on edge. He moved closer to the group, now consisting of miners, dock workers, and a couple of former gladiators. All large mechs and all with deep reasons to be angry. The mech at the center of their attention, the grey and tan behemoth was still talking, holding their attention like a ring master at Golden Age Circus. And that was when it hit him. There was something wrong with the mech. Yes, he looked the part, but it was too perfect, and under the grime and filth it was obvious that his finish was too perfectly tarnished and his tools were not worn enough for a mech who eked his living out under the surface of Cybertron.
Smokescreen turned away from the crowd and walked away from the assembly, heading directly toward a nearby alley while managing to look completely mindless and nonchalant. As soon as he was safely in the shadows between two buildings he opened a channel to Mirage.
“Mirage, we have an issue down here,” he said over an ultra-secure communications line used by the Special Operations team.
“And that would be?” Mirage prompted in that bored drawl he seemed to always use when dealing with the psy ops agent.
Smokescreen bit back an angry retort. Somehow the spy always managed to push his buttons no matter what he said or did. Even the most polite conversation ended with Smokescreen ready to throttle the former noble.
“I’m out looking in the old market and all anyone’s talking about is how Prime was assassinated. According to the whispered chatter, Magnus, Prowl, and the rest of the Brass are all either offlined or fighting over who gets to be in charge,” he replied as he pulled back further into the alley as a pair of civilians strode past, both clearly looking for a fight. “We’re looking at the start of a panic down here, and I’m pretty sure there’re Con agents stirring the pot. We’re gonna have a full on riot pretty soon if these people aren’t told something definitive soon.”
“And what precisely do you want me to do about this?”
“Well, gee, I don’t know, ‘Raj. Maybe go tell Prowl and Magnus? Since you’re still in the base playing ‘Divine the Jazz’ you’re a little closer to them than I am right now,” Smokescreen snapped back. “And as we’re looking at Decepticon infiltration and a potential leak in regular communications I thought this might be a safer way of getting the news back up there safely.”
Mirage made no attempt to hide the sigh of irritation at the mangling of his name. “What makes you think there’s infiltration?”
Smokescreen looked out of the alley. The miner’s audience had grown and he was working them into a frenzy. Rather than describe the scene he raised the sensitivity of his mic and allowed Mirage to hear the crowd.
“We need to demand an answer from, them! They have been lying to us from the beginning and we deserve the truth! It is our right as citizens and they cannot deny us OUR RIGHTS! And if we need to march our way up there and take that information by force then so be it!”
The crowd roared in response yelling their agreement and demanding answers from the Autobot command.
“And that’s a small group. I’d say there are only fifty mechs listening to him,” Smokescreen said. “The thing is I know this con. I’ve run this con and I can tell you that this mech isn’t working alone. There’ll be at least two more mechs out there working the citizens into a frenzy.”
There was a long pause before Mirage spoke again. “Okay. So someone’s taking advantage of the situation. And, yes, maybe they are Con agents. But that is not our concern right now. We are supposed to be focusing on Jazz.”
“Oh for frag’s sake, Mirage! I am looking for Jazz! I’m busy doing my damned job down here! Protecting Iacon!” Smokescreen snapped back. “Now pull off your blinders and look at the big picture! The Brass needs to know that there’s more going on here and you’re in a better position to pass on the intel than I am! Now go stop wasting time and go earn that extra pip you were so quick to throw into my face earlier!”
With that he shut down his side of the connection and slid further into the alley, leaving the crowd and the potential riot behind. He needed to get himself back together and get his irritation under control before he said or did something stupid. Just as he reached the other end of the alley he saw the two civilians from earlier. These two were being more subtle than the miner, speaking with people in hushed voices and leaving agitation in their wake. This was another con he recognized. It was one he and Swindle had run countless times before both before and during their time with the Combaticons. But he’d never stuck around to see the aftermath, or taken the time to consider the general people who were hurt all in the name of a distraction and a larger score. Old guilt and a new Autobot mentality vied with his need to get back to the mission at hand. In the end duty won out – if he took the time to intervene he’d lose any chance he had to find Jazz. Not that he had had any luck up to this point.
He hated to admit it, but maybe Mirage had been right, that maybe this plan of a physical search and using his contacts wasn't the best of plans after all. Still, he wasn't about to admit total defeat and run back to Mirage's inevitable gloating without being completely sure. Turning away from, the crowds, he headed off to check near one of the old safe houses he knew of. He still had contacts in the area, and if he was inordinately lucky, he'd end up with more to go back to Mirage with than a bruised ego.
Chapter 7
Fandom: Transformers: Generation One
Characters & Relationships: Smokescreen, Mirage, Jazz, Prowl, Ratchet, Bumblebee, Optimus Prime, Ultra Magnus, Red Alert, Ironhide, Perceptor, Wheeljack.
Jazz/Prowl, Wheeljack/Ratchet/Perceptor, mentions of Smokescreen/Swindle, Jazz/Mirage, Jazz/Smokescreen.
Rating: R
Warnings: graphic violence, dub-con, attempted rape, implication of bondage, mentions of rape, mentions of torture, reprogramming, tactile, spark-sex, plug-and-play
Summary: A year ago Jazz was captured by the Decepticons and reprogrammed into a walking time-bomb. Now that he has returned to the Autobots his new programming has kicked in and he has left chaos in his wake. It's up to Smokescreen and Mirage to find Jazz and bring him back to their side and back to sanity before he is completely lost. Meanwhile Prowl and Ultra Magnus try to keep Iacon from destroying itself as panic grips the populace, and as Prowl fights for his sanity after a year's separation from his bonded and the sure knowledge that Jazz may not survive.
Link to the fic on A03 or read it below! Comments and critique are greatly appreciated!
Chapter 5
Smokescreen stalked the small boardroom like a caged animal. He and Mirage had set themselves up shortly after they had received their orders, but after a full night of research and vaguely hostile discussion they hadn’t come to any form of viable plan. And the Praxian was just about ready to walk away from the whole thing and take matters into his own hands.
“We should be doing something, ‘Raj! Sitting here plotting out potential angles isn’t going to help anyone!” Smokescreen railed.
“I already told you we need a plan before we run off half-cocked,” Mirage replied with the calm patience one reserved for a dull-witted sparkling. “And it’s Mirage. Not Raj. You don’t have the right to use such informalities with me.”
Smokescreen stopped his stalking of the room and brought his hands down heavily in the table causing the holomap to shiver and jump at the vibrations. “We have a plan. I have given you a perfectly viable plan, Mirage,” he sneered, putting far too much emphasis on the first syllable of the spy’s name. “All we’re doing is wasting time. Time that we should be spending finding Jazz. In the hours we’ve spent sitting here on our afts he could have been-”
“And you suggest we go about finding him by simply asking?” Mirage asked, interrupting the tirade. “And while we’re down in the slums asking every criminal and low-life if they’ve seen Jazz, what’s to stop them from telling the Decepticons? Or tipping off Jazz and forcing his hand?”
“Oh? And what do you suggest we do, Mirage? Continue researching all the possible places he could possibly be hiding and hope he stays put? That’s even assuming he’s still in Iacon!”
“He’s in one of our old safe houses,” the spy said, never looking up from the map he was examining.
“And how do you figure that?” Smokescreen asked.
“It’s what I’d do.”
Smokescreen looked at Mirage, incredulity written all over his face. “It’s what—Okay, fine. So you think he’s in a safe house. Which one? As I recall we had over a dozen in Iacon alone and those are the ones I knew about. I’m sure that you two kept things from me during my tenure with Special Ops. But let’s say for sake of argument that there are only the twelve; how do we even know that he’s still in Iacon? Primus knows if it was me I’d take the first opportunity to get as far away as possible. Especially since he probably thinks he’s killed Prime.”
“Yes, but you always did have the distressing habit of trying to leave before the job was fully done,” Mirage replied blandly.
“I most certainly did not!” Smokescreen snarled, doors pinning back in an uncharacteristic display of emotion. Unlike his fellow Praxians, Smokescreen had never had any difficulty keeping his expressive doors stock still.
“Of course you didn’t,” the former noblemech replied, never attempting to hide the sneer in his voice. “And you’re ignoring the key point. Jazz isn’t done yet. It makes no sense to take out Prime alone. He isn’t our only commander and Jazz made no attempt to destroy the Matrix. If he was compromised by the Decepticons, wouldn’t you think that their plan would involve more than just killing Optimus Prime?”
Smokescreen stepped back and resumed his pacing, though he moved slower than before. “I think you’re giving the ‘Cons too much credit. Besides, Prime’s death would be a huge blow to all of us. Yes, someone else could take over, but it wouldn’t change the fact that this would be the third Prime we’ve lost in recent memory and would be a huge blow to morale.”
“Morale can be lifted. Yes it would be a blow, but we've risen from worse,” Mirage replied dismissively. “No. Jazz is most certainly not done yet. He needs to take out Ultra Magnus first and then Prowl.”
Smokescreen stopped his pacing and pursed his lips thoughtfully as he ran over the new data.
“And then he needs to take you out too,” he said, looking pointedly at Mirage.
“How do you figure that one? Wishful thinking?”
Smokescreen snorted. “Hardly. Unlike some people, I don't tend to hold grudges against people who've done nothing wrong. No. My point is that he tried to take out Bumblebee and yet left Ironhide alone.”
“And yet he killed those security guards,” Mirage replied thoughtfully. “So you're suggesting that he specifically targeted Bumblebee? And the guards were simply in the way?”
“Exactly.” Smokescreen made no attempt to hide the smug tone. “Yes, Bee may have been in the wrong place at the wrong time, but so were all those medics and yet, Jazz never attacked them. Or should I say, never killed any of them. Plus, he never took anyone out on the way to getting Prime.”
The blue spy was silent for a long moment before nodding slowly. “You may have a point in that. But all that does is further cement the idea that Jazz will have remained in Iacon. He is nowhere near done with three targets left to take out.”
“Four,” Smokescreen replied.
“Three. Ultra Magnus, Prowl, and myself. You are no longer Special Ops.” A silent 'and you're no threat' hung in the air unsaid between them.
Smokescreen’s optics narrowed and for a brief moment seemed to flash an almost purple shade before he calmed, refusing to rise to Mirage’s baiting.
“Fine. Three,” he said tightly. “You know what? You keep going over those maps. I’m going to do some actual leg work on this.”
Without waiting for a response, Smokescreen turned and left the Special Operations office.
---
The streets of Iacon were practically buzzing with the controlled panic of a populace on the edge of hysteria. As Smokescreen walked among the other pedestrians’ whispers reached his audios.
“… the Prime’s dead …”
“I heard that it was a coup. That he was killed by his honour guard.”
“… Decepticons invaded the base! They killed everyone!”
“I’m telling you, Megatron has the Matrix! We’re all walking dead mechs!”
The conversations were all the same. All whispered in hushed voices as the mechs looked about surreptitiously desperately searching for proof among their fellows that the rumours were false, and yet at the same time there seemed an almost pathological need for the tales to be true. Anything would be better than the wash of nothing that they’d been receiving lately from the Autobots.
Smokescreen shook his head as he worked his way around a cluster of miners. This panic was only going to increase until it came to a complete boil and the Autobots would be facing a war on two fronts. The Decepticons at their gates and rioting civilians inside the walls. It was a situation he had seen far too many times in the past and every one of his instincts was telling him to run, to cut his losses and get while the going was still good. It’s what he and Swindle would have done back in the day.
At the thought of his former partner, his spark clenched painfully. It had been almost two full vorn since he and Swindle had gone their separate ways and since Smokescreen had joined the Autobots. But they had been together for far longer than that and the memories were still fresh and painful. Especially the memories of that last failed meeting and the resulting incarceration of the Combaticons. Perhaps things would have been easier if Swindle actually was dead rather than trapped in a Decepticon mind prison.
“They’re lying to us!”
“Yeah, but about what?”
Smokescreen pulled his attention away from his own old spark-ache and turned back to the matter at hand. The murmurs and the grumblings were becoming more specific as groups of mechs started to focus their fear and anger. He quietly moved to a nearby storefront and began to peruse the merchandise, blending in with the mid-afternoon crowds as he took in the surrounding conversations and mechs.
“The Autobots, obviously!” a large grey and tan mech said, irritation coursing off of him in palpable waves. “Regardless of what happened, they’re not telling us the truth, and if they’re lying about something as big as the Prime getting offed, what else are they keeping from us?”
Smokescreen focused his attention on this new mech. He was large, both broad and tall and he had the look of a deep surface miner. But there was something wrong with him, something about the whole situation that set the Praxian’s doors on edge. He moved closer to the group, now consisting of miners, dock workers, and a couple of former gladiators. All large mechs and all with deep reasons to be angry. The mech at the center of their attention, the grey and tan behemoth was still talking, holding their attention like a ring master at Golden Age Circus. And that was when it hit him. There was something wrong with the mech. Yes, he looked the part, but it was too perfect, and under the grime and filth it was obvious that his finish was too perfectly tarnished and his tools were not worn enough for a mech who eked his living out under the surface of Cybertron.
Smokescreen turned away from the crowd and walked away from the assembly, heading directly toward a nearby alley while managing to look completely mindless and nonchalant. As soon as he was safely in the shadows between two buildings he opened a channel to Mirage.
“Mirage, we have an issue down here,” he said over an ultra-secure communications line used by the Special Operations team.
“And that would be?” Mirage prompted in that bored drawl he seemed to always use when dealing with the psy ops agent.
Smokescreen bit back an angry retort. Somehow the spy always managed to push his buttons no matter what he said or did. Even the most polite conversation ended with Smokescreen ready to throttle the former noble.
“I’m out looking in the old market and all anyone’s talking about is how Prime was assassinated. According to the whispered chatter, Magnus, Prowl, and the rest of the Brass are all either offlined or fighting over who gets to be in charge,” he replied as he pulled back further into the alley as a pair of civilians strode past, both clearly looking for a fight. “We’re looking at the start of a panic down here, and I’m pretty sure there’re Con agents stirring the pot. We’re gonna have a full on riot pretty soon if these people aren’t told something definitive soon.”
“And what precisely do you want me to do about this?”
“Well, gee, I don’t know, ‘Raj. Maybe go tell Prowl and Magnus? Since you’re still in the base playing ‘Divine the Jazz’ you’re a little closer to them than I am right now,” Smokescreen snapped back. “And as we’re looking at Decepticon infiltration and a potential leak in regular communications I thought this might be a safer way of getting the news back up there safely.”
Mirage made no attempt to hide the sigh of irritation at the mangling of his name. “What makes you think there’s infiltration?”
Smokescreen looked out of the alley. The miner’s audience had grown and he was working them into a frenzy. Rather than describe the scene he raised the sensitivity of his mic and allowed Mirage to hear the crowd.
“We need to demand an answer from, them! They have been lying to us from the beginning and we deserve the truth! It is our right as citizens and they cannot deny us OUR RIGHTS! And if we need to march our way up there and take that information by force then so be it!”
The crowd roared in response yelling their agreement and demanding answers from the Autobot command.
“And that’s a small group. I’d say there are only fifty mechs listening to him,” Smokescreen said. “The thing is I know this con. I’ve run this con and I can tell you that this mech isn’t working alone. There’ll be at least two more mechs out there working the citizens into a frenzy.”
There was a long pause before Mirage spoke again. “Okay. So someone’s taking advantage of the situation. And, yes, maybe they are Con agents. But that is not our concern right now. We are supposed to be focusing on Jazz.”
“Oh for frag’s sake, Mirage! I am looking for Jazz! I’m busy doing my damned job down here! Protecting Iacon!” Smokescreen snapped back. “Now pull off your blinders and look at the big picture! The Brass needs to know that there’s more going on here and you’re in a better position to pass on the intel than I am! Now go stop wasting time and go earn that extra pip you were so quick to throw into my face earlier!”
With that he shut down his side of the connection and slid further into the alley, leaving the crowd and the potential riot behind. He needed to get himself back together and get his irritation under control before he said or did something stupid. Just as he reached the other end of the alley he saw the two civilians from earlier. These two were being more subtle than the miner, speaking with people in hushed voices and leaving agitation in their wake. This was another con he recognized. It was one he and Swindle had run countless times before both before and during their time with the Combaticons. But he’d never stuck around to see the aftermath, or taken the time to consider the general people who were hurt all in the name of a distraction and a larger score. Old guilt and a new Autobot mentality vied with his need to get back to the mission at hand. In the end duty won out – if he took the time to intervene he’d lose any chance he had to find Jazz. Not that he had had any luck up to this point.
He hated to admit it, but maybe Mirage had been right, that maybe this plan of a physical search and using his contacts wasn't the best of plans after all. Still, he wasn't about to admit total defeat and run back to Mirage's inevitable gloating without being completely sure. Turning away from, the crowds, he headed off to check near one of the old safe houses he knew of. He still had contacts in the area, and if he was inordinately lucky, he'd end up with more to go back to Mirage with than a bruised ego.
Chapter 7