I’ve been thinking of my Jazz and Prowl dynamic in TFHD andit’s making me feel a little crazy
Jazz has a lot of history with the guy who is effectively part the most ancient lineage of Cybertron (Optimus) and there’s already a sense of trust and dependability between them when Jazz joins (he does so after the war began because he had to be in hiding as a refugee for a while). It’s immediate and steadfast in the way they interact with one another and it directly conflicts with Prowl’s new position as Head of Tactical.
Prowl is by all means a foreigner to this kind of dynamic between these two, and the palpable difference in how Optimus acts is instantaneous, something he only saw before with Optimus and Elita (even then with more constraint and with an authoritarian hand looming over them, both being essentially equals as the leader of the Autobots). More than this, he doesn’t trust easily, so Jazz’s presence despite being a friend of Optimus is immediately suspicious and strange to him, especially when Jazz is almost immediately taken into the highest inner circle.
The ease in which Jazz conducts himself is strange. How he talks to people is strange. Jazz is strange.
Prowl also isn’t adjusting well to the change in command. The rest of tactical is in rough conditions, not enough mechs to fill the spaces and all worked to the bone, including Prowl. The previous head of tactical was Elita, and she had to go guide a splinter group of Autobots on another planet and establish a second main Autobot base. He was underprepared because of the time limits of his training, and really, people didn’t like him all that much. He was too quiet, like he was always thinking about something else at any given moment (he usually was), and didn’t talk to people much outside of directing people and giving orders. There was a little but growing tension due to stress and the change that division underwent.
Jazz was smart. Incredibly so, actually, having a keen eye for detail without losing sight of the bigger picture. Jazz was on temporary rotation within multiple Autobot divisions, including tactical, and it was clear to both Prowl and those working with Jazz that he was good at this. Why was he good at this? As far as Prowl knew, Jazz had no formal training for tactical or even half the other things he was involved in. Why did he know those codes? Those maneuvers? Some of them were exclusively a Praxian practice that Prowl himself had implemented.
It all changed when tactical was split in two. The Autobot forces began to spread to thin that there were tears in their defenses where tactical presence was little to none, so the main tactical division at the First Autobot Headquarters (Elita’s being deemed the Second once established) was being divided between multiple outposts around the immediate star systems outside their own, including Prowl and Jazz. They were to head to an auxiliary station where tactical alongside some foot soldiers would be sent off their separate ways to go to their assignments. However, on the way, they were sent off course by a small Decepticon fleet of ships (which held a significant percentage of probability of happening).
None of the contingencies for the scenario worked. They were sent further off course, eventually reaching a sector that was cordoned off because of it being a wall of superheated gas clouds, acting as a natural buffer to the star system beyond it. They were sent through it, the ship they were on being more or less ripped into shreds alongside multiple of the Decepticon ships burning up in the gas. In a small pocket of the gas clouds was a fresh little planetary system, one fully formed planet orbiting around a small but hot star, young. It was their only chance of anybody surviving, and Prowl, as the highest ranking officer onboard, sent them to the planet in hopes of some chance of survival, no matter how bleak.
This planet, twice the size of Earth, hot, the only water on it being deep below the crust in small, cavernous pools. Seemingly uninhabited by any intelligent lifeforms. Grey sand deserts surrounded the entire surface of the planet, and in clusters, towering spines of glass protruding from the ground. Cool air from the caverns mixed dangerously with the hot surface-level air, so highly intense sandstorms were frequent, ones that created a lot of friction and a lot of lightning. By all means, it was barely inhabitable.
Now, they were stuck on this planet, knowing for certain that the Decepticons weren’t far off, and Prowl was stuck with people who knew combat in theory. And Jazz, who knew it in practice, alongside foot soldiers with no particular expertise in anything but combat on Cybertronian landscapes.
And the secret third entity of course
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