Transformers: Survival of Defective Products

He spoke naturally, still holding her hand.

Jazz seemed to have suddenly received a message far beyond the processor's computing power. The brightness of the optical lens did not change, and his hand did not loosen. The entire machine just stood there frozen.

After a moment, the vector gesture asked, "Jazz?"

"Hmm." The response was a beat late.

"I'm going back now."

"Okay." Jazz nodded, his movements a beat slower.

Yin Vector looked at him for a few seconds, resisted the urge to wave his hand in front of him, and stood up from the platform.

The lady remained seated. She took a few steps, then turned back and asked, "Are you alright?"

"It's nothing." This time, his reply came a little faster than usual, which was strange.

The vector was temporarily accepted.

She returned to the main hall, where the Autobots, who had been scattered around, immediately turned their audio receivers back to normal and busied themselves suspiciously.

Smokescreen crouched beside the partition, seemingly engaged in a serious discussion; Bumblebee stared at the blank screen; Arcee stood on the platform, inspecting the weapons she had checked several times; the ambulance stood with its back to the rest area, the wrench in its hand remaining motionless for a long time.

Optimus Prime remained relatively calm, glancing at Jazz sitting in the distance: "Finished talking?"

"almost."

Smokescreen immediately looked up: "What did you talk about?"

He looked at her and said, "Didn't you hear everything?"

"I didn't!" The main hall fell silent. Smokescreen immediately realized he had denied it too quickly. "I meant... I didn't hear you all."

The vector, too lazy to investigate, said, "I'm going back to the contact point."

Optimus Prime opened the land bridge, guided himself to the entrance, then turned and waved to the Autobots: "See you next time."

Bumblebee waved first, followed by Baffle and Smokescreen raising their hands, and Arcee nodded from a distance.

The ambulance driver reminded them, "Don't forget what you promised!"

Jazz finally emerged from the rest area, raising his hand only slightly and moving somewhat slowly: "See you next time."

The vector entered the land bridge, and the blue-green light disappeared.

The jazz man lowered his hand, remained silent for a few seconds, and then lowered his head and laughed.

At first it was just a slight smile, but it quickly spread from the corner of his mouth all the way up, and even the optical lenses under his goggles were so bright that they couldn't be hidden.

He tried to control his expression, but failed.

The smokescreen approached first: "She's talking about jazz, isn't she?"

The man tried to maintain a normal tone: "Yes."

Arcee stepped off the platform: "You're smiling as if you think there's more to it than that."

"She likes jazz." Jazz leaned back against the console. "She had excellent taste in music even in her human days, so of course I'm happy."

Bumblebee let out a series of mocking laughs. Jazz looked at him and asked, "What are you laughing at?"

Bumblebee shrugged innocently.

The partition honestly said, "You look like Smokescreen is seeing Optimus Prime for the first time."

The smokescreen quickly protested: "I wasn't laughing like that!"

The ambulance finally turned around and glanced at Jazz: "Mr. Mask, you'd better tone down your smile."

Jazz subconsciously touched the corner of his mouth: "Is it that obvious?"

Several machines stared at him, and even Optimus Prime remained silent and did not come to his rescue.

Jazz gave up, since the vector had already left, and she did say Jazz.

Whether she was referring to music or him... it doesn't matter.

Jazz couldn't help but laugh again.

Smokescreen turned to Bumblebee and whispered, "He's finished."

The bumblebee nodded in deep agreement.

-

The vector was redirected back to the temporary judicial liaison point on Earth.

When Jiuqi saw her return, he immediately looked up: "Did the Autobots talk to you?"

"Yes, we've finished discussing part of it." The vector head walked toward the main console, where the private meeting request from the sound wave was displayed.

The sound waves detected those things but did not report them. This restraint deserved a response, so she turned on her private channel and took the initiative to contact them.

"I'm going to the Retribution Hall." She added, "We can talk now."

The sound wave quickly replied: [Entry permitted. Meeting area cleared.]

The vector looked at AZ: "I'm going to the Retribution Number."

AZ didn't ask for a reason: "Is monitoring required?"

"unnecessary."

Jiuqi stopped what she was doing: "You're going alone?"

"Don't worry, it's just a conversation."

Nine-Seven glanced at the meeting information from Soundwave: "But sometimes he knows too much."

I deeply sympathize with the vector.

She checked the private frequency band and confirmed that the emergency contact system at the communication point was working properly before activating the short-range land bridge: "I'll be back soon."

97: "I hope so."

-

Vector went directly to the intelligence room of the Retribution. When she arrived, only Soundwave was standing at the door waiting for her. The Laserbird on her chest was not there; it had probably been sent elsewhere beforehand.

The information room contains only one main screen and two data terminals.

Only after confirming that the door was closed did the sound waves begin their formal conversation.

[Private meeting.]

No regular record copy was created.

[Data retrieved: Deleted.]

Vector looked at his screen and asked, "How much did you delete?"

The screen displayed the number of records that had been erased, more than she had expected.

The sound waves not only detected that AZ had adjusted the data, but also determined the approximate location from several subtle fluctuations. If it continues to analyze for a while longer, it will definitely be able to find the specific target area.

"Why didn't you tell Megatron?" Yin Vector asked.

The risks outweigh the rewards.

Yin Vector couldn't help but chuckle, but didn't press further: "Thank you."

The sound wave lowered its head slightly and pulled up another set of data, a behavioral model covering millions of years.

Vector saw her name appear in the center, surrounded by numerous nodes: Charon, the Judiciary, Optimus Prime, Megatron, War, the Covenant, Autonomy, Long Coma, and many other choices she herself had almost forgotten.

The sound wave recordings were so complete that she wondered if they could be compiled into a life memoir.

"...Aren't you taking a bit too many notes?"

[For predictability.]

"...Uh, what about the success rate?"

The speaker paused for a moment before replying with a visible face on the screen: "Below expectations."

"That doesn't seem like my problem."

It's your problem.

Vector: "...?"

He zoomed in on a gap in the center of the model: [The existing model lacks a crucial premise: human life experience.]

Vector, abandoning his joking tone, asked, "You mean you've realized you don't understand me?"

"Yes," the sound wave readily admitted, "the new premise can explain some of the previous anomalies."

"What about the rest? Why only a portion?"

Your calculations have consistently deviated from the expected results.

Vector crossed his arms: "What are you doing? Why does it sound like I've been getting in your way?"

【fact.】

"Okay, have you finished recalculating?"

The sound waves merely displayed the readjusted node connections in front of her. Human experiences were incorporated into the model, but it was just an extra background on the outside; her name remained firmly in the center.

Update complete.

The vector pointer zoomed in and looked at the screen: "What's the conclusion?"

The existing conclusions remain valid.

The sound waves displayed several sets of words: 【Spark intact】【Consciousness source does not change current identity】

Then he said in his native tongue: "Vector: Vector."

Her optical glasses flickered slightly: "You don't mind that I used to be human?"

【mind.】

The vector paused, followed by a sound wave: [Mind missing information. Source not important.]

He was only bothered that the model he had built over millions of years was missing its original premise, but he did not believe that the human life of that period would render her ineffective now.

"So you contacted me just to update the data?"

The sound wave remained silent for a long time, and the display screen showed no expression. Vector patiently waited a while before finally seeing his reply: "No."

Before she could ask further, he explained: "We need to confirm that you haven't been subject to denial due to the disclosure of information."

The vector quieted down.

Soundwave has been observing, the judicial authorities have not revoked her identity, the Autobots have not rejected her, and Megatron, though devastated, thankfully does not believe that she is no longer Graviton.

He carefully assessed the reactions of all those in the know.

"What if someone disagrees?" she couldn't help but wonder.

【correct.】

"How to correct it?"

The sound waves silently displayed a set of combat data from the war on the screen.

A Decepticon who had publicly and maliciously brought up the identity of a defective vector vector was removed from his core position by Soundwave shortly after making the remarks, and has never been close to the core power circle since.

Vector covered his face with one hand: "You call this correction?!"

【efficient.】

However, her legal process may not recognize this approach! She will not pursue the matter for the time being.

Are you interested in my past life?

【Yes. 】

"What do you want to know?"

The sound wave thought for a moment, then sent a message: "Are you willing to provide it?"

Vector nodded: "You can say some things, but you are not allowed to investigate my human identity through other channels."

A subtle pause appeared on the speaker's face as he narrowed his eyes through his optical glasses: "You've already investigated?"

【try.】

"You found it?"

No valid results found.

There was no trace of the Heavenly Arrow here. Yin Xiang pondered for a while. She had long felt that this place was more like a parallel universe, but she had never looked for her family here and was not sure for the time being. Now that she heard this, her guess was probably right.

She sighed and finally said, "You're not allowed to investigate anymore."

【obey.】

So Vector took the initiative to talk about some things from the past, repeating what she had told Jazz to Soundwave, but without going into as many details about her life as she had told Jazz.

Shengbo didn't ask what his parents did or where their home was.

He was more concerned about whether this information would influence her current behavior: [Early survival pressures lead to a tendency to develop long-term risk contingency plans.]

Vector: "Could you please stop acting like you're writing a medical record?"

The sound wave deleted the line of text, and after a few seconds, he spoke slowly and softly in his natural voice:

"You shouldn't have had to bear it all alone."

Vector paused for a moment. This was not the way sound waves usually expressed themselves. It was probably because he had painstakingly researched a lot of information and painstakingly put together a response that she could directly understand.

She hesitated for a moment, but the sound wave didn't need her to say anything. There was a moment of silence between the two machines; the sound wave was used to silence, and the vector was used to communicating with him in this way.

His profile picture lit up again: [Follow-up secret operation: Advance notification recommended.]

"You've started too?"

Risk management.

"You just want to know what I'm doing."

After a brief silence, Soundwave stated frankly: "The two are not contradictory."

Vector was speechless at this frankness and could only concede with amusement and helplessness: "I will send you the security status and approximate risk level before the operation."

【enough.】

Both parties quickly reached an agreement on the sound wave shutdown behavior model.

Yin Xiang had thought the conversation was over, but then he leaned forward slightly to stop her.

There's one more thing: you were once human.

[It's still a variable.]

Her eye twitched slightly: "Are you praising me or scolding me?"

[Factual description. Praise tendency.]

Vector laughed out loud, not pressuring Soundwave to say anything more, after all, this was the best evaluation he could give at the moment.

Soundwave opened the door to the intelligence room, walked out, and then turned back to say, "If you want to know in the future, you can just ask."

The sound wave nodded slightly, and he recorded this sentence.

The vector followed the passage toward the land bridge, and just as it turned the corner, a tall purple figure appeared in front of it.

Shockwave stood in the middle of the corridor, having waited for some time, his single eye landing on her.

"Is the conversation over?" "Yes, it's over."

"I also need to talk."

For some reason, she suddenly had a very ominous premonition.