@prowlexesweek Prowl Exes Week Day 6 - Optimus Prime
Keeping your husband-slash-boss out of trouble is a full-time job and Prowl deserves a raise. I have completely given up on making sense of IDW Prowl’s ever-changing design and lack of decent references so I’m just making it up as I go now.
*wheezes sadly* frick I REALLY wanted to do more for this week in general, but time is rude so I just had to colour the sketch. Prowl is my boy he deserves more 😔 hopefully I can at least put together my idea for day 7 and end on a high-note
The place they went next was not far from where Prowl had started his morning. Another of the Prime’s ideas: rather than divide neighborhoods by previous faction to identify tension points, as Prowl would have, Optimus insisted sworn enemies should be made to share residential blocks. This put Wheeljack two doors down from Bombshell, and Soundwave and Rodimus literally side by side; Prowl had given up tracking all the potential security breaches after he started getting constant headaches.
Optimus also refused to restrict how bots could personalize the homes they were allocated, which was incidentally how this one so often managed to stay off the radar. Everyone expected its occupants to splash the walls and windows with purple badges, but aside from the scaffolding for its never ending remodeling, the building was unadorned, leaving many to assume it belonged to neutrals. The reality was much more complicated, and unfortunately, Prowl understood it intimately.
This time, he did not have time to knock or call out. The door flung open while he and Chromedome were still steps away, and Prowl would have been knocked over by the first frame that charged out had he not also been grabbed and held up by the next.
“Guys, it’s Prowl! Prowl’s back!”
“We know, dumbaft.”
There were clangs and pings as two of the Constructicons scuffled, Prowl making himself small to minimize the risk of being pulled in. The one holding him—Hook—took this as permission to begin exploring his frame with indelicate probing.
“Your finish looks awful. Repaint?” he asked.
“Want me to do something with this one?”
Prowl’s gaze snapped over to Scavenger, who had grabbed both of Chromedome’s wrists before he could get away and was hoisting him up. Chromedome was struggling valiantly and uselessly.
“No. Put him down,” Prowl said, breaking free of Hook with much less effort. Scavenger dropped Chromedome, who wasn’t expecting it and fell straight to his knees, his civilian armor suddenly making him look very even smaller amid the Constructicons. They and Prowl watched him scramble back to standing and come to Prowl’s side. His engine had reignited in the scuffle and was rumbling at a low pitch, and he looked like he might transform and race away at any moment. Prowl considered backing out now, but decided it would be more humiliating than bearing whatever welcome the Constructicons had in store for him.
Trying to maintain whatever (illusion of) control he could, Prowl let himself in while the Constructicons stepped out of his way to let him. The house, like all the others around it, had been designed for a maximum of three occupants, and just in terms of stuff it was clear that this one was being stretched past its limits. The meeting table had been converted into a lab bench, the space underneath taken up by demolition equipment. The floors and most of the chairs were covered in piles of Scavenger’s ‘treasures,’ adding to the home’s signature smell and reminding Prowl he would need to make this the sanitation inspector’s first stop, once they had found someone to fill the role. Even Hook’s filing cabinets made the room feel more cluttered. Prowl took the back of one chair and leaned against it while he watched the Constructicons file in, Chromedome standing just behind his right shoulder.
“Where were you two nights ago?” Prowl asked.
“Dunno, working?” Hook said. He’d been the last back inside, but he made up for it by striding straight to Prowl and making a grab for his arm, which Prowl narrowly avoided. “Come on, Prowl, don’t exercise your cog enough, gotta make sure it’s still working.”
“Exercise your—”
“Details,” Prowl said, cutting off Chromedome’s question. “I need to know exactly where you all were and what you were doing.” He swatted at Hook’s hand when it moved in again.
“Long Haul, Scavenger, and I were all out in the wastes, picking for materials,” Mixmaster offered. Emboldened by Hook’s advances, he was coming up on Prowl’s other side, where Chromedome was standing. The latter ducked close enough Prowl could feel the tingle of an electric field against his doorwing.
“Long Haul, is that true?” he asked, doing an excellent job keeping his voice even.
“No,” Long Haul said, loftily.
Prowl felt a burst of wind against his cheek, like the bristles of the gentlest cleaning brush, as Hook swung around and clanged his fist against the side of Long Haul’s head.
“You’re not doing anyone any favors trying to cover your dignity,” Hook said, “especially yourself. Now tell Prowl the truth or you’ll have to start making stories for every dent I’m about to put in you.”
Long Haul’s engined snarled, and then the two were on each other. No parchment-thin civilian plating on them: they were all thick plating and heavy machinery, and as they rolled and threw each other across the floor, the entire house shook with them. The scattered junk was tossed into even greater disarray, or else crushed underneath them. Prowl stepped back to avoid the spray as one of Mixmaster’s beakers popped when Long Haul landed on it. Chromedome was no longer immediately behind him, and instead had backed himself entirely into the nearest corner. Not an entirely ineffective strategy: with three Constructicons still standing between them and violence, it was probably one of the safer places in the room to watch from. Prowl, though, stayed close and maneuvered himself so he was directly behind Bonecrusher, close enough to be heard over the din of the constant blows.
“And what about you, Bonecrusher?” he asked. “Two night ago. Think carefully.”
“Workin’,” Bonecrusher said.
“Where?”
“You know where we work.” Bonecrusher half turned, breaking Prowl’s perfect cover. On the other side of the room, Long Haul went down hard. Pieces of surveying equipment and the floor underneath them were crushed into a crater.
“Shut that Primus-stained mouth—”
Long Haul flipped them with another smash, and the colors of Hook’s cursing took on vibrant hues.
“I need it on the record,” Prowl said, ducking from flying shards of Hook’s shattered windshield.
“Hrmph,” Bonecrusher said, no longer looking away from the fight.
“The Vermillion Diamond,” Scavenger said, inserting himself between Prowl and Chromedome with all the grace Primus could have bestowed on an excavator. “Mixmaster got fired for trespassing in the refinery, but the rest of us rotate guard shifts.”
“So two nights ago, Bonecrusher, you were working at the Vermillion,” Prowl said. “I need you to think about that night. Did you see anything unusual during your shift? Anything at all?”
“No.”
“Anything.”
Hook landed on the ground in front of them. He fought to sit up, a terrible grinding noise coming from his left leg.
“You could get straight at BC’s memory yourself, you know,” he said as he rose to his knees. Long Haul loomed on the other side of the room, hunched in readiness. “Just give the word, boss.”
Prowl scoffed. That was a conversation they had already held many times, to the point the Constructicons could repeat back to him the reasons combining was off the table word for word.
One: combining was illegal. Cybertron could not afford the inevitable reconstruction costs, both in terms of labor and resources. A single combiner event could add years to their current plans, which were already riddled with delays and shortages. This law had been almost entirely Prowl’s work.
Two: the Constructicons would gain access to the classified meetings and reports Prowl needed to do his job correctly. He had information on the current state of Cybertron that no civilian had reason or right to know, and he had no reason to trust that the Constructicons would keep safe any secrets they pulled out of him.
Three: even if he did, he would be forced to raise their security clearance. The paperwork involved…
Four: once they had the clearance, they would be all but required to take part in policy making. Resources were so scarce that whenever they became available they had to be put to work almost immediately, and that included personnel. Optimus would probably gladly invite them, always looking to involve Decepticons in the most exploitable positions in their government. They could have the most violent batch of Decepticons ever constructed making decisions that shaped Cybertron for years to come.
Five: the Constructicons didn’t like making decisions. With the exception of Hook, they liked to have plans made on their behalf, fashioning themselves into the tools that would allow others’ visions to come to fruition. Prowl would have to start thinking on their behalf (again) which would add to his near-insurmountable pile of work. He might have to stop recharging altogether and just live on nucleon until his t-cog gave out.
Six: all decisions from then on out would be heavily weighted in Prowl’s favor. Maybe they wouldn’t have the same level of influence as the councilors, but that many voices could push the enforcer center through to a vote, lobby for more funding in the next budgeting round, add firepower to the leverage he was trying to build against certain loud voices…
Prowl shook his head, realizing his thoughts had gotten off track and he could no longer remember the question he’d been asked. The room waited in tense silence; even Long Haul watched stock still. Prowl felt a tickle under his nasal strut and brushed it away before he answered.
“I—”
“Can’t.” Chromedome interjected by stepping physically in front of Prowl. The Constructicons all tensed, and Prowl did, too, uncertain how they were going to react. “Absolutely cannot. That’s—you’re suggesting combining, right?—that’s illegal. Right Prowl?”
Prowl startled and blinked, freeing his mind from the sudden fog that had encased it.
“Yes—right. No.”
“But—”
“Long Haul, finish what you started,” Prowl snapped. He didn’t know which one he’d cut off. “Bonecrusher, this is the last time I’m asking: did you see anything?”
Long Haul yanked Hook back into the brawl before Prowl had finished speaking. Without moving to better cover, Bonecrusher let his optics dim as he accessed his memory banks.
“The Combaticons showed up,” he said.
“Yes?” Prowl pushed. “What was noteworthy about that?”
“Swindle’s blacklisted them after the time Onslaught showed up to drag him away on a mission,” Bonecrusher said, optics coming back online just in time to sidestep Long Haul stumbling back. “Got word from one of the higher higher ups to let them in that night, though.”
“And what did they do once they were all in the building?” Prowl asked. Chromedome was listening closely now, even leaning in slightly, and Prowl felt a thrill to have something to show for this miserable venture.
“Wasn’t all of them, just Onslaught and Vortex,” Bonecrusher said. “I let them in, gave Vortex a couple warnings when he tried to act smart. They took the elevator straight up to Swindle’s penthouse. They weren’t up there long; came back down dragging Swindle along. He was saying something about debts? I think?”
“Swindle’s always on about debt,” Mixmaster said.
“Yeah,” Bonecrusher said. “So, I don’t know exactly, but if I had to guess, it was something like that.”
“Did you, at any point, see Onslaught or Vortex interact with Ratbat?” Prowl asked.
“Uh, no?” Bonecrusher said. “They went straight to the elevator, like I said.”
“Is it possible the elevator could have made a stop on its way to the penthouse?” Prowl pressed.
“No.”
Prowl could feel Chromedome staring at him, waiting for a moment of brilliance. No, probably waiting for him to fail completely. Briefly, he regretted bringing Chromedome with him, before remembering that Chromedome was, in fact, absolutely essential for this investigation to see an end.
“Okay,” he said as he turned away from Bonecrusher. “So, it’s unlikely that either Onslaught or Vortex could have been in direct contact with Ratbat, but not impossible; despite what he says, they went through a period of time without surveillance, and we need to look at any possible opportunity. Furthermore, there are still two Combaticons left unaccounted for. It could be that Vortex’s taunting was a distraction meant to allow Brawl or Blast Off to sneak into the building.”
“But that’s assuming the Combaticons could outsmart a single Constructicon,” Hook said from where he was picking himself up off the floor. Long Haul stood above him, nonplussed by his victory. “Which they couldn’t.”
“89% probability they could, even without Swindle,” Prowl said, not sparing them a glance. “Consider this from a motive standpoint: why would the Combaticons want to rob Ratbat?”
The room rattled with the Constructicons’ laughter. Prowl tried not to startle, but he saw Chromedome twitch.
“Now that is a great question, Prowl,” Mixmaster said as they came down. “Why would anyone bother trying to rob Ratbat?”
Prowl’s gaze snapped around.
“What do you mean?” he demanded, advancing quickly on the towering warrior.
“Everybody knows he’s nothing but a load of talk,” Long Haul said, forcing him to turn again. “He’s always asking for bots to lend him shanix for cards or trying to rope little guys into his easy money schemes.”
“His new scheme has been telling the higher ups the credit dispensers are broken, then pushing them until they load whatever he wants into his wallet.”
“He was accusing them of stealing from him last time I was there,” Scavenger added.
Prowl took a long look at each of the Constructicons, who straightened whenever his optics landed on one of them. They weren’t good at lying. Not to him.
He pretended not to notice Chromedome watching him.
“That concludes this part of my investigation,” Prowl said, flicking his doorwings with a note of finality. “You are now free to continue on about your day. You know how to contact me if you think of anything else that might be relevant.” He took on a thoughtful expression, ignoring their confused, upset clamor. “Mixmaster, let me know when you would like to return to work. I know of an opening.”
He left immediately, pushing through the Constructicons with the strength of his glare and just a few harsh words. Chromedome, lacking such options, faired worse, and had to rush to catch up once he finally stumbled free of the house.
“So, what, it was that easy?” he asked as he caught up. “Case closed?”
Prowl measured his tone very carefully as he answered.
“No,” he said. “Not yet. There is one more step we need to pursue.”
FIC - Prowl Exes Week - Prowl/CD, "Try to get out but we just keep stickin' around"
Fandom: Transformers - All Media Types, The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Rating: Explicit
Wordcount: ~1600
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Prowl/Chromedome
Additional Tags: Sticky Sexual Interfacing (Transformers), Mnemosurgery (Transformers), Unhealthy Relationships, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, mention of chromedome's many dead husbands, One Night Stands, Memory Loss
Summary:
The first time Chromedome came to him in the middle of the night, Prowl hadn’t put it all together until afterwards.
(For Prowl Exes Week, day one: Prowl/Chromedome, cyclical.)
