#polyhex

Jazz knew he was in a Med-clinic. Very few things smelled quite like a Med-clinic. Though why Rung had stayed with him the whole time, he wasn’t sure.

“How are you holding up?” Rung asked softly, to not startle the blind ‘Hexie.

“…. Ah wanna go home.” He replied, fidgeting with his hands and picking at peeling paint.

There was a knock on the door before Rung could reply, and Jazz heard the light mech hurry over and out, closing the door and speaking in hushed tones to what was clearly a medic. He tuned up his audial horns to listen in…

“Please, refrain from yelling, Ratchet. He is blind and already very nervous. I am not surprised at all- he is very far from home, after all.” Rung said.

The other, Ratchet, apparently, sounded far more gruff, “alright. What in the Pits happened? You disappear off the face of Cybertron for a deca-cycle and appear at my clinic with the Iaconi Enforcers and a train’s worth of kidnapped mechs!”

Jazz hummed a quiet note, shifting the tune a little until he reached a pitch he could hear, but very few who weren’t Polyhexian had the capacity to register. The room’s dimensions and objects began to ‘appear’ as he used the tone to map out the room with his ‘echolocation’.

“I was undercover, dear friend. The Enforcers had suspected of such kidnappings and asked me to go undercover to help them break up the ring.” Rung replied to Ratchet.

Of course Jazz’s echolocation only really worked in enclosed areas or in close proximity to objects, but that didn’t stop him from slipping to the window and climbing down the wall from the second story. He didn’t trust it here. He wanted home, Punch, and Ricochet. Oh Rico… Ah’m tryin’ t’ come home. Ah promise.

His audial horns picked up the door to the exam room opening again, and dropped the rest of the way to the ground, bolting for an alley he’d located.

Ratchet opened the door to an empty exam room, “Rung? I thought the patient was in here.” He scowled.

“He is,” Rung said, stepping in behind before stopping and staring, “or he was.” He looked around, “I am unsure of where he went.”

“….. Rung, what did you say his frame type was again?”

“I didn’t- he’s Polyhexian. Why?” Rung asked, gaze flicking to Ratchet, then following his gaze to the open window.

Ratchet cursed, hurrying to the window and looking out, “Polyhexians have a submetalline heritage. Their ancestors lived wholly underground until the nobility rose.”

“I am… unsure why that is important.” Rung said, walking over to join him.

Ratchet pointed at the single Polyhexian dipping into an alley, “they are able to hum in a pitch the we can’t hear to ‘see’ in the dark. It’s of no use in open spaces, but in a city, if he makes it underground…”

“We won’t be able to find him,” Rung realized in growing horror, “Jazz will be lost in a foreign city with no way to get home.”

Ratchet pushed away from the window and hurried downstairs, sending a ping to the Enforcers to get them on the case of the missing patient immediately, running to the alley and stopping in the entrance.

Jazz’s head snapped up, the mech tugging on a sewer cover, trying to dislodge it. The two ‘stared’ for a moment, before Jazz yanked the cover off and dropped inside.

“Wait!” Ratchet bellowed, running to the open hole and looking in, “stop!”

Ironhide arrived with his partner a few breems later, “what happened, Ratchet?”

“He’s dropped into the sewers. You won’t be able to track him down there without another Polyhexian, or…”