Spoiler: not really spoiler but to be safe? Every time jazz calls soundwave 'love' while still letting all that anger show through, and while he's being as sharp and nasty as he can manage, five years are added to my lifespan (*´ω｀*)
SHRIEK Spoiler Jazz threatening to TAKE AND KEEP LASERBEAK!!!!!! He knows what happens to symbiotes when they're separated from their carriers for too long! And he's STILL planning to do it! And Soundwave finally figuring out how to use the music and telepathy as a weapon! And going RIGHT for the throat! (i would have liked it even better with the bravery's i want to be your skin, from the club scene, but this was probably better for remembered physical input to overwhelm him). They've both been pushed to such ruthless extremes even though they should be standing back to back and helping each other and I LOVE IT (and rodimus is such a good boy. he is SUCH a good boy. he's saying awkward things and sticking his foot in his mouth, but he's so good-natured and he's trying to just do what's RIGHT and i love him)
Spoiler that was kind of upsetting! (but they still can't bring themselves to shoot each other, and good on Hot Rod for trying to intervene)
Spoiler: UPDATE TEXT for spock Their lead wasn’t very great, but the two of them were much faster than he was. Soundwave pounded up the stairs, devouring the corridors in his long strides, and all the while his audios tracked them pulling further and further away, Jazz’s pleas to run faster eventually dwindling to mere echoes. The ambient sounds of explosions and firefighting, meanwhile, became louder and louder, until Soundwave crashed through the door separating stairs from the corridors of Decepticon Headquarters and straight into a warzone. The headquarters of the empire had been reduced to ruins. Huge gouges had been ripped through the outer walls, rubble cascading across the floors and acid rain pouring through. All power was down. It was the work of massive artillery, and now Soundwave knew what the explosions had been. The Autobots, after invading through the space bridge, had taken the city’s own anti-air guns and swiveled them around to point at the building itself. How had they moved about in the city? Using his thrusters to pop over the spreading puddles of acid, Soundwave moved down the passage and turned the corner, where most of another wall had caved in. A huge cylindrical structure had been forced right through the cannon-strafed wall, familiar looking though it took Soundwave a few seconds to place it. It was one of their own silos from the spacebridge grounds, used to store fuel and therefore built to be impervious to the elements. It had been torn off its foundations and used to roll down the streets of Iacon, carrying the attacking Autobots inside. Oh, how Soundwave had not missed Prowl’s unexpected displays of strategic creativity. Soundwave maneuvered around it, trying to hail Megatron’s frequency on a repeat three-astrosec basis and still not succeeding. He could hear a battle though, without question, and he turned to follow the sounds as fast as his thrusters could take him. Barely had he made it around the next bend than he came face to face with Chromia and Firestar, poised on a mound of rubble just inside the shelter from rain, razor-thin swords in each hand. They looked up sharply at his entrance and flipped on bright headlights, immediately overpowering his night-adjusted optics. Soundwave flinched and dove back behind the corner, blinded, expecting to be shot at any second. He felt nothing, however, didn’t even hear anything, and after his vision had calibrated again he dared to peek around the wall. Both were gone, as if they’d never been; vanished like ghosts in that sinister way that Elita’s soldiers had always excelled. Rifle primed and ready to fire, Soundwave crossed the silent room. Nothing moved except the rain sheeting outside, hissing and popping against the broken steel. It was falling on something else too, which Soundwave saw when he drew close enough: Shockwave was sprawled across the wreckage and completely exposed to the rain, his body crisscrossed with hundreds of thin cuts into which acid seeped and bubbled. There was nothing Soundwave could do for him, even to reach out and pull him back inside, but anyway it was too late. Soundwave got no response for his hail, and the single optic that had carried Shockwave’s emotional expressions for all his life was now flat and dark. He was quite dead, and it had not been done kindly. Again, even more urgently, Soundwave set a comm for Megatron. Somewhere behind him, in the depths of the building, he heard a familiar roar. When Soundwave finally found Megatron, he found the heart of the battle. The Autobots had held nothing back; having already peeled away his air support and officers, their artillery had now peeled away most of the building around him. Megatron was pinned down under what shelter he could take, alone, and carrying on a one-sided war against every other Autobot in the building. In his beast form, and unbothered by what rain did trickle down his back, Grimlock opened his jaws and bellowed again, a roar answered in kind by Megatron’s gun. It had to charge up again, leaving Megatron to fight off Ironhide and Sideswipe and just about everyone else with only his own fists. Now Soundwave could see why he hadn’t been answering Soundwave’s hails - he simply didn’t have the spare second to do it. Watching him, Soundwave felt a flicker of that old awe. Megatron’s gray armor was already streaked from close calls with acid rain, and he may have even been shot, going by that bad scorchmark on his left arm. But nobody would ever know it from the unflinching way he threw himself into combat, outnumbered a dozen to one and still holding his own. This was how he’d inspired a revolution. Soundwave was preparing to move in and assist when he caught sight of Jazz again, dragging Hot Rod ruthlessly by the arm. He’d skirted the melee and was trying to haul Hot Rod up the scree of a collapsed stairwell, where glowlights indicated a hovering shuttle. Hot Rod had balked at the rain and was resisting, slowing them down. Soundwave started to follow, but then Megatron hurled an Autobot against the stairs and the whole ramshackle structure shifted, tipping them off it. Jazz scrambled for a handhold, probably would have found one if he wasn’t also shoving Hot Rod to safety, slipped, and tumbled down the wreckage almost right at Megatron’s pedes. Megatron looked down and saw who it was, and the blazing hatred in his optics was something Soundwave could see even from here. Already he was sprinting towards them, body moving on instinct, but which one was he going to help? His processor froze and he nearly tripped, stumbling with indecision. Jazz knew he was in trouble the moment he looked up, and he did his best to scrabble away, but he was not fast enough. Megatron had him in his sights, and he would never let this one get away. The mighty fusion cannon on his shoulder fired into Jazz’s chest point blank, throwing Jazz’s body back against the wall, by which time he’d moved on to other Autobots. Soundwave thought he might break from grief at the sight. Immediately Megaton flew out of his mind as he flung himself at Jazz instead, covering his body with his own so that he might shield him from the rest of the battle. Jazz could not be dead - no, not so quickly, he couldn’t be taken from Soundwave so easily! Jazz was his. But Jazz’s visor was flat black, his body lifeless under Soundwave’s anxious touch. He could feel no sparkbeat, felt nothing from his vents, not even a whisper. The damage was still smoking hot to the touch, but the smoldering chips of armor around the blast were all that moved. No no no. Soundwave was too frantic to consider giving up, even as the fight raged behind him. Surrounded by enemies, no one to guard him, Soundwave pulled back from all external sensors and let himself collapse on top of Jazz, diving into what he hoped remained of Jazz’s mind. Blackness. Silence. Void. Abruptly separated from all the thunderous noise of the world, Soundwave drifted through nothing, pure absence of light and sound. After all his times visiting here, it was surreal to come inside Jazz and find silence instead of song. Where was all his music? If it was gone, did that mean - “Yup,” someone said, and Soundwave whirled around. The other mech sported a loud red paintjob on his armor, edged with flashy gold accents. Otherwise he looked very like Soundwave - humans had mistakenly called them cousins - though he was one model size smaller and many vorns younger. Blaster crossed his arms and nodded, optics somber. “It means he’s dying. In fact, he’s already dead.”
/deep breath/ aaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHGH!!!!!! Spoiler YES GOOD BUT AT WHAT COST
Spoiler Like, Soundwave wouldn't be having spontaneous visions of Blaster in Jazz's head at this point if we weren't about to have some kind of convenient fake out/resurrection, right? Right
OH MY GOD I'm just going to copy over my comment because I'm way too worked up to type things again Spoiler I'm dying, I'm DEAD, I was ready for things to escalate, but! Not this way!!! ;-; I whispered a quiet 'oh, jazz' when he took that fall because he was trying to protect rodimus, and I gasped when megatron just shot him point blank. I was expecting soundwave to choose jazz (again), if he we forced into a choice, but I wasn't expecting him to not have a chance to act on it, oh my gosh. (and I love how we've seen jazz be mister acrobat for ages and ages, and then it's when he's more focused on protecting someone, that's when he takes a fall, with such serious consequences) But! Everything in here! Oh my gosh! Seeing Chromia was FANTASTIC, I'd been worrying she's have trouble with like... autonomy and remembering how to be her own person after everything Shockwave did to her. It was so great to see her fighting back, and what was done to Shockwave is such a great echo of the way he tortured her. The way she and Firestar just let Soundwave be and peaced out, it makes me wonder if she and the others were told by Jazz to try not to kill Soundwave unless they had to, that he's not like the others. Seeing Grimlock and the others all fighting back, oh man. And seeing Megatron fight! Even as despicable as this Megatron is, that FIGHT. Without having to put the story on pause or overdescribe, you got that intensity across like WHOA. And! Blaster!!! I'm choosing to believe Jazz isn't beyond saving (because I can't, I'm too emotionally invested ;u;), and seeing BLASTER! I still can't decide whether it's more likely that he's himself or some kind of echo from one of their memories, but I'm stoked, however it plays out. Maybe he'll give Soundwave some kind of clue about music and Soundwave will be able to use the music hack in a positive way instead of as a weapon. My private quiet hope is that Soundwave gets some kind of closure for how hard he tried to save the cassettibots, but I can't see any way for this to play out that WON'T make me flail from excitement. I'm just dying, everything about this update is fantastic. (and soundwave thinking jazz is dead, right after they parted on such bitter, hurtful terms! and how soundwave hasn't made a real move to fight back against any of the autobots! Even when there's a mob of them piling into megatron and megatron could PROBABLY use a little assistance! (i'm so glad the cassettes were safe at home and not around for the surprise attack) and soundwave leaving his body and being vulnerable with this massive fight going on! making an obvious move to protect jazz and NOT help megatron, when megatron is so furious and needs assistance! EVERYTHING!)
Spoiler Secret want: Soundwave and Blaster save Jazz through Shenanigans, but Soundwave comes out of his fugue in time to see Megatron about to smash him for not helping ASAP, so Jazz wakes up in the nick of time to shoot Megatron in the face right over Soundwave's shoulder
Spoiler Slight tweak: Megatron slams Soundwave aside and gets a few good hits in on him first for his BETRAYAL :D Maybe he tries to turn his attention back to Jazz and Soundwave tries to get between them And he's taking damage and Jazz kills him. But..... HMMMMM. I'm kind of wondering if SOUNDWAVE will kill Megatron. Jazz feels hurt and betrayed and is sure Soundwave chose Megatron over him. There wouldn't be any clearer way for Soundwave to communicate that this definitely is not the case.
Spoiler can't help going back to all the blaster parts..... CHRIST........ and ohhh man laserbeak......
