Chapter Text
"Any of ya'll got any ideas for what you want to sing for the festival?" Jazz asked, warming up his electro-base. It was the morning after Prowl had agreed to let his creations participate. The sparklings had barely eaten their breakfast before begging to start their first practice.
"Sire's song!" Bluestreak was quick to pipe up.
"Sire's song?" Jazz clarified, thinking that for the first time in his life his advanced audials had betrayed him.
But the sparkling nodded.
"He used to sing it every night before we fell asleep!" Bluestreak ran over to his Creator, once again weaponising those bright blue optics. "Please sing for us again Sire!'
This had to be another of the sparklings' jokes. Jazz had kept an optic on the Captain during their puppet performance and Prowl didn't appear to be able to even clap in time.
Well if this was a joke, it appeared Captain Prowl was willing to indulge his sparklings in it as the mech turned towards Jazz.
"May I borrow your electro-base?" The mech asked.
For a moment, Jazz's claws dug deeper into his base. Not that the base was really his for he had nothing. But it was the closest thing that he could call his own. When the electro-base had been donated to the Temple, Master Yoketron insisted that Jazz use it to help everyone to show their love for Primus through song. Jazz seen through the mech's excuses but as usual, he had let himself be selfish enough to ignore them. He would not let himself be selfish now. The base was meant as an instrument to share Primus' lessons as much as it was an instrument of song. And one of those lessons was that his creations should learn to share.
So after a slow nod, Jazz held out the electro-base.
As with everything he did, Prowl treated the passing of the instrument with upmost seriousness. He cradled the neck with hand, the body with the other, holding it as strong and steady as he would one of his own sparklings.
Jazz was surprised to find that once it was safely in the Captain's hold, he didn't hesitate to let it go.
They all quickly migrated to the drawing room, Prowl sitting in the centre of the room, while his creations sprawled out on cushions at his pedes.
Jazz settled against the wall as Prowl strummed the strings, the notes simple but soft on the audial.
Then, the Captain started to sing.
It was an old Praxian folk song. Jazz had lost track of how many times he'd heard it. And he's heard it sung by everyone from all walks of life, from an inebriated homeless mech to the star of an upscale restaurant. Jazz even sung the song himself during service of his own Temple.
The Captain might not have been the most talented singer Jazz had ever come across. Prowl's voice was free from the flashiness of extended trills or high notes that Jazz had heard from the entertainers at clubs that Master Yoketron wouldn't have approved of him sneaking into. But Prowl sung with a simple straight forward honesty that caught Jazz's spark.
Jazz leant forward, optics closed behind his visor so he could fully focus on that soft sound.
He wasn't surprised it helped the sparklings sleep. Jazz had never had a home, but within that honest tone, he could hear what one was supposed to feel like.
When Jazz opened his optics again, those brilliant blue orbs that he once called cold now burned with care for his creations and kin, were already pointed at his own.
Jazz's spark skipped a spin.