[Phone]

[Jazz isn't too surprised by the response people had for his previous message.
It was frustrating, but he understood. Still, the fact that they were content to sit under Mayfield rule simply because it meant they would be safe another day was what really worried him. There was. O longer a neutral Cybertronian faction in the war precisely because they had done the same thing, until they had been completely wiped out by the Decepticons. Sitting idly by was not something he felt was an option. It probably hadn't been for a very long time.

He just had to make the rest of them understand.

When he begins his speach this time, he's using the same accented inflection he was last time. Still, there's a certain note of tension in his voice. The message in his words today are carried by something he has never been very comfortable speaking about. But he's never let discomfort stop him from something he knew was important.]

Some of you doubt my ability to fully comprehend the gravity of my words. It's understandable. It's often easier to accept the rule being forced on you then it is to take the risk of endangering yourself to stand up for freedom. If you don't fight back, maybe they'll leave you alone. But how long will you allow them to prove your false sense of security wrong before you finally stand up and oppose them?

Some have even asserted that they tried to rise up and were punished for it. Droned, as it were. They forced you to believe you were happy and content in this prison for a time, and that was so terrible that you submitted, even after you were set back to rights and knew it had been a lie. Surely, I could not have any way of knowing the ordeals you have gone through to try and shake Mayfield's rulers from their throne.

I tell you today, Mayfield, that I do know. We all have memories of our homes. Lands and countries and worlds and planets where we were happy and free. My home, however, is one that has been torn and destroyed by civil war for an entire generation. I've seen entire races slaughtered in the fight between two factions, and I have myself experienced the kind of torture Mayfield threatens you with when they display brutalized bodies and bloodied gurneys. I know that fear, and have been broken by it. Beaten and tormented because of your captor's sick sense of humor until you're unable to even raise a hand to fight back when their back is turned and the weapon of their destruction within your reach. Forced to watch your friends traumatized until they cry for mercy and know that you're next, and that no mercy will be given.

And I've seen what happens if one chooses not to fight back and try and remain peaceful. On my world, there are no peaceful innocents. They've been wiped out of existence because they thought simply obeying the rule of the ones currently in control would mean mercy.

There is no mercy. Not from people like this, Mayfield.

So yes, Mayfield, I am ready for the consequences of my words. I refuse to allow them to murder me while I sit by and play nice. In turn, I ask you; are you ready for the consequences of your inaction? When the time comes that the rulers of Mayfield play their hand and move to wipe us all out, will you be able to accept that in doing nothing, you have allowed them their victory?

[Around Town]

[For the past few weeks, slowly, posters have begun appearing on store windows, walls, and light-posts. They are styled after the propaganda posters of the Earth's 1940AD decade, when the world was at war with itself. All are unabashedly Anti-Mayfield and calling for the prisoners to rise up and fight against Mayfield's control as one.]

[461 Stone Street/Garage]

[After giving the speach over the phones, Jazz settled into the garage, sliding the sofa out of the way and clearing a large area of the concrete floor so that he could train. He's been needing to do this for a long time, anyway. His human body doesn't "remember" how to move the way his real body does, and it makes him clumsy. He needs to remedy that. Which means hours and hours of hard work.

So he's there, wearing a pair of the loose-fitting, comfortable pajama pants, but shirtless, as he goes through the motions if the beginner-level Cybertronian martial arts he's such an expert in in his normal body.

It's frustrating, how much more awkward he feels doing it this way. He's not used to being in absolute control of his body.]

[Phone]

[When the voice starts speaking over the phone, it has none of the vocal intonation that he's recognized for. It's strong, stern and serious instead of light and playful, and speaks with a well-imitated British accent.]

Ladies and Gentlemen of Mayfield, I pose to you a question. Have you ever sat and wondered to yourself "What, just what, would happen if all of us stood together and shouted at the top of our lungs - 'We're not going to play by your games any longer'?" Does Mayfield really have the power to retaliate against a force of that size? Strength is in numbers, my friends. I say perhaps it's time to stand up, together, and let our puppeteers know that we're cutting the strings. Let them punish us. They've already shown they don't want to get rid of us. If we die, they bring us back. If they drone us, it wears off and we're back to the people we rightfully are.

Punishment from tyrants is merely an attempt to keep the people under their rule just afraid enough that they don't see how weak their hold really is. They want you to think they have almighty power, when really it is they who are afraid. They're afraid because they know if they did not keep you down, you would be able to break their bonds. They are afraid because they need you to play their little game. They are afraid because they know if you stood up together and refused to allow them to rule you any longer, their castle would come tumbling down like a deck of cards.

And if they are not afraid, then why punish you? [Pause, for dramatic effect. Let the question linger for just a moment to sink in.]

If they truly had the power to keep you here no matter how hard you tried to fight against them, there would be no reason to punish you. Your own helplessness in the end, after months and months of trying to escape only to be met with nothing, would be the only punishment needed to keep the people of Mayfield from rising up against them.

And so they beat you, and they kill you, and they drone you, and they display glorious alters of their debauchery and brutality for all to see, to keep you afraid! They display the bodies of those they've killed - those of them who have done as you all should and risen up to oppose the others amongst them - all in an attempt to strike fear into your hearts and keep you cowering under their shadow.

Do not let their cowardice intimidate you, Mayfield. Strength is in numbers. If you stand together, Mayfield will fall. If you work together, there's nothing they'll be able to throw at you that you won't be able to recover from. It's time to throw off the shackles, Ladies and Gentlemen. It's time to show them that you're no longer afraid of them. It's time to take arms against this Sea of troubles they've thrown us into, and by opposing, end them.

[There is another pause, and then a soft click. Perhaps he's hung up. Or perhaps he's still there, listening. Either way, he won't be replying to any responses he receives.]

[461 Stone Street]

[There's a knock on the door in the afternoon, and when he opens it, he finds a small box sitting on the step, addressed to him. He blinks, curious and confused at the same time, though more then a little suspicious when he sees it's supposedly from one of the people that's running this place.

It's not too surprising, with that in mind, when he opens it wearily, holding a pot-lid out between him and it, as if it's a shield to protect him in case the thing explodes.

What is surprising, though, is when he finds tucked inside a small, pale-blue glass visor, like a pair of sunglasses meant for humans but looking exactly like his visor. He blinks at it, putting it on and glancing around, and feeling, strangely enough, a little more like himself. It makes him smile.

He's about to toss the box in the garbage when he sees a small picture tucked in the bottom. It looks for all intents and purposes like a ball of lightening arcing between two poles, but the second he goes to pick it up and his finger touches it, it's like his mind opens up and clears, snapping back into contact with his bonded's and reconnecting for the first time since he and Prowl were both thrown into this accursed city.

Love, concern, suspicion, planning, tactics, strategising, all the things that make up Prowl come flooding back into his mind and makes his chest ache, a gasp hitching out of his lips. He doesn't move for a long moment, just absorbing the feeling, basking in it and awed that it's back so suddenly.

And then his feet are moving, rushing him to his bonded's side, where he wraps his arms around him tightly, clinging to him and burying his face in his shoulder. At least this time, if Jazz seems to be crying behind that shiny pair of shades, it's not from the stress disorder he's been recovering from the past few days.

He's just gonna...hide against you for a while there, Prowl, and soak up all of you. Don't mind him.]

[Olney's Tavern]

[Hours later, Jazz creeps into the bar, as well-kept and dressed as one might expect to see, though he's taken to wearing the clothing Mayfield has given him in a less rigid style; denim-blue shirt untucked, top two buttons undone to show the white t-shirt underneath and the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. Hey, you can make anything look nice if you work with it. His visor is tucked, folded in his pocket, though he'll refrain from wearing it for the time being.

He's not in a particularly good mood when he walks behind the bar. He'd rather be at home with Prowl, away from the public eye. He's still feeling depressed after what happened, but has at least recovered enough that this isn't a huge problem. Just...an irritation. He's only here because he knows they'll drone him if he doesn't come. He's got things to do and doesn't have time to deal with that right now.

Still...when he pauses to look at the rows of bottles and glasses, he can't help but feel a little...lost. He doesn't know the first thing about mixing alcoholic drinks! Hell, he's never even had any! Whoever thought putting an autonomous robotic extraterrestrial to work as a bartender obviously wasn't thinking things through.]

((OOC: Jazz has started his revolution. /o/ And his first day of work. COME TEASE HIM FOR HIS LACK OF ALCOHOL-MIXING SKILLS, MAYFIELD! <3))

[Phone - accidentally open to all, meant for Dr. Ilsa Higa. Backdated to an hour or two after this.]

[When his voice comes over the line, anyone who'd spoken with Jazz in the month since he's been here will be able to hear the almost-hysterical, wrecked tone that's become of his normally dulcet voice. He's barely keeping himself under control and can barely seem to keep from hyperventilating, and if the phone sounds like it's rattling, it may or may not be because he's unable to stop shaking.]

Dr. Higa, I-I...I...h-...hhhow predictable is it f-...for people t'come back from the...[His voice cuts off and for a long time, the only sound that comes over the other line is ragged gasps. He comes back only to make an abrupt change of subject, putting a bit more strength in his voice then he had before.] W-w-would you be able t'write me up some sorta reference on all th'weak points on a human body? L-like places t'be careful of if I'm tryin' t'restrain someone. My martial arts trainin' only taught me about my own species bodies an' humans are a lot weaker'n I don' know what's diff'rent an' what might hurt 'em if I do it wrong 'cause it's diff'rent an' I don' wanna kill anyone 'cause I put too much pressure or twisted wrong or-or-or...!!!

[Which is where his voice finally reaches the panicked, horrified keen it had been threatening at the entire time and he simply dissolves into sobs. The phone makes a bit of a thunk sound when his head hits the kitchen table, curled up in his seat, feeling like he's going to be sick, like his entire body is numb, like he's tearing apart from the inside out and he doesn't know how to stop it.]

[Action - Hours later]

[He hasn't left the house since he got home. He's barely spent time away from the make-shift bedroom they'd set up in their garage. Things were too hard to think about at this point, hurt too much to process, and yet it was all he could do, curled up under the covers on their sleeper-sofa in a tight little ball, hugging Prowl's pillow like it is Prowl. It's only by the grace of the no-family-in-the-garage they've put on the drone families in their houses that he's had any peace, and Thank Primus that the drones actually listen to little things like that, like they really are the "man of the house." The wife would come from time to time, knock on the door and ask if he was coming in for dinner, but when he gave no answer, would simply flutter off to do whatever pre-programmed thing she'd been set up to do.

Which is just as well. He doesn't have the strength right now to throw her out. He doesn't even have the strength to even care right now. Physically he's fine. He's had enough experience with shell shock, has suffered it enough and remembers the distinct hurt it caused, to know that's what this is. And he just doesn't care. Just when he thinks he's cried himself out, some image will cross his processor and he'll burrow his head into the pillow as it starts all over again.

It does hardly any good, knowing he's supposed to be coming back any time now. The deaths he's known have all been permanent. He's been fighting a war for millions of years. After that much death, you don't simply lose the emotional reaction it causes in you simply because someone tells you "it's not real." Not when you did it with your own hands]

((ooc: Action and Phone tags to the phone call are welcome. Action tag to Jazz-in-the-garage is reserved for Prowl's mun.))

[He and Prowl have been here alone long enough. They've settled in. Somewhat. Their "stepford families" are a bit of a thorn in their sides, but moving their sleeper-sofas out to their garages and alternating spending the night at each other's houses has helped with that. Now it's time to get to work.

First order of business: Finding out if they're the only Autobots - or Cybertronians period - that have also been brought to the city. Of course, if he just broadcasts who and what he is, he's unlikely to get any Decepticons to answer. So he has to be neutral about the whole thing.

Or as neutral as possible. Hopefully it works. So have a voice calling out a rather strange greeting over the phones today, Mayfield. He's fully aware that humans don't know it. But that helps narrow down who's been brought here with him and Prowl.]

Bah-weep-Graaaaagnah wheep ni ni bong.