Trailbreaker did have a plan. A stupid, reckless, beyond idiotic plan. But with Ion's body lying deactivated on the floor of the shuttle, the captured mechs knew that if they didn't try something, chances were they would end up in a similar condition. It was no secret that the Autobot high command wouldn't negotiate with terrorists, even if the hostages consisted of mostly injured and terrified university students. Even so, the red Autobot sigil gleaming on Trailbreaker's chassis gave them hope that he could help.

"Here's the deal," Trailbreaker said quietly to the group of bots that circled close around him. "I want y'all in the best condition to pair up with an injured mech. We need to be fast if this is gonna work." Ratchet glanced back at Perceptor who was struggling to remain conscious as he laid against the hull of the shuttle. "They have to be taking us to Kaon, but I don't know where we'll touch down. It don't matter though, as soon as this ship stops moving, I'm gonna extend my force field and blow out the back. Kaon's in ruins, so as soon as there's an opening, y'all better run like slag. Find a place to hide until the heat passes and then just go. And keep going until you get out of Kaon. Not a single bot's gonna pick your afts up unless the distress signal's coming from way out of town."

The mechs surrounding him gaped and Ratchet physically felt his spark sank. What the pit sort of suicidal plan was that? Finally, someone spoke up, voicing the question they were all thinking. "They're armed. How the slag are we going to outrun gunfire!"

Trailbreaker actually started laughing and Ratchet couldn't help but think that the mech had utterly and completely lost his mind. "Zigzag. Makes you a harder target to hit." Ratchet shuddered, trying his best not let panic flood his system and Trailbreaker chuckled. "Hey, I never said it was a good plan, but do any of you have any better ideas? Cause I'd sure love to hear them."

A long silence followed before a small mech spoke up. "Why run?" he said. "I-if we do as we're told and don't talk back they won't hurt us, r-right?"

Trailbreaker sighed. "Maybe, maybe not. But take this into your considerations. You can either be killed here, press-ganged into a group of murderers or try and get to safety," he said and glanced at Ion's body. "Anyone in here unaffiliated can stay if they want. Anyone who wears an Autobot symbol sure as slag better run cause you can bet they'll scrap you as soon as they notice it," Trailbreaker said and Ratchet swallowed as his optics were drawn back to the Autobot symbol on the black mech's armor, standing out like a target. "I'm not sure when we're landing, but as soon as we do, every one of you have better made up your mind. Hesitating isn't going to help your chances. I'll keep my force field up as long as I can, but as soon as we hit cover, split up. It'll make us harder to catch."

Ratchet rubbed his optics until he saw static but it was Wheeljack who spoke. "What do you think our chances are?" he asked.

Trailbreaker shrugged and ran a hand over his helm. "Can't say," he admitted. "No matter what, I'm going for it. Getting shot in the back is better than sticking around to be tortured. Call it a desperation act, but I've seen what they do to Autobots they capture and I'm not about to be sent to the Well with my internals hanging out."

Wheeljack's optics widened to the size of discs but Trailbreaker just patted his shoulder before looking at Ratchet. "Get your aft in gear, medic. Get your friends taken care of and ready to go," he said and motioned to Wheeljack and Perceptor before heading towards the back of the shuttle. Ratchet looked at his friend and rubbed his face, trying to get any sort of sensation from it. He was still too deep in shock for his sensors to register much, but at least he was aware of it enough that his spark didn't start overworking to try and fix it.

"What should we do?" he asked at last.

Wheeljack sat down hard next to him. "Slag if I know," he said quietly. Ratchet looked at him before noticing the pink glow of energon drip onto his friend's shoulder.

Ratchet winced and turned his face towards him, realizing what Trailbreaker had meant. The gap where Wheeljack's blast mask met his neck was leaking energon down his neck and shoulder in little pink streams. Ignoring the fact that his hands were still shaking and Ion's body still lay on the ground mere yards from them, Ratchet grabbed his shoulder and said, "Let me look."

Wheeljack quickly shook his head. "It's fine."

Ratchet glared and grabbed one glowing headfin as he tried to get up. "If it's bad, it's going to fill up behind your mask and then you'll be drinking it," he said, remembering all those times his professors had admonished him about his bedside manner. "Last thing we need is you purging up over processed energon. Now let me look."

Wheeljack sighed before slowly retracting his blast mask, biting back a cry of pain as it scraped his ruined faceplate with partially dried energon. Ratchet swallowed put kept as good of a poker face as he could manage as he assessed the damage. The soft, flexible metal of his faceplate had been effectively shredded, exposing the wires and protoform underneath and destroying the structure of his lips and nose. Shrapnel was still embedded in the soft mental and Ratchet hoped that no rust or other small debris had made it into his system.

"They got you pretty good," Ratchet said and reached into his subspace and pulled out a small med kit. He'd forgotten to empty it out after class earlier in the day, but he was glad for it now. It wasn't much, but at least it had a cleaner and sealant inside to stop the leaking.

"Too bad. All my good looks are wasted," Wheeljack said only to wince as he attempted a small smile.

Ratchet snorted and shook his head. "This is gonna sting, but try and keep your face relaxed," he said, not wanting to accidentally tear his faceplates even more. He shook out his hands, trying to get the tremors to stop before picking up the clean rag out of the kit and dousing it in cleaner. "I don't have the supplies to patch it back together—you're gonna have some impressive scars until you can get a new faceplate made," he said and carefully started cleaning the area of partially congealed energon. Wiping the mess off was the easy part, even if Wheeljack winced and closed his optics while he did it. The hardest part was getting his hands to stay steady enough to handle a pair of tweezers to remove the scraps of metal and broken glass he found embedded in the soft material of his face.

Wheeljack stayed still and quiet even though Ratchet could hear his vents heave and sputter with every gentle touch. Ratchet cleaned and sanitized the area as best as he could but it was hard with the shredded flaps hanging like ribbons. He suppressed a shudder as he saw his friend's dentals and glossa through one of the tears in his cheek. "Slag," he muttered and looked away, choosing to look at the bottle of sealant instead. It was meant for small fuel line ruptures and armor cracks, not heavy shrapnel damage on such a sensor heavy surface as a faceplate. "Hold on Jack. This is going to hurt like the pit," he warned and carefully sprayed some of the sealant onto the wound.

Ratchet could see his dentals clench together as he hissed in pain, optics shutting tight. He held onto his hands until the pain subsided and Wheeljack shuddered. "I could taste that. Why could I taste that?" he asked, trying his hardest to speak without moving his mouth too much, even as he lifted a hand up to feel the damage. Ratchet grabbed his hand and shook his head and understanding dawned on the mech's face. His optics brightened from blue to near white and Ratchet was afraid he was going to stasis lock on him.

"Hey. Hey!" he snapped and Wheeljack's dazed optics focused on him again. "Just calm down. We can panic all we want later, but I can't carry you and Percy out of here," he warned, knowing that if Wheeljack broke down, he wouldn't have a slagging chance of keeping himself together. Both of them were hanging on the ragged edge of panic, having experienced so much, just overnight.

Wheeljack shuddered, his armor rattling before he took a few fortifying breaths. He looked at his friend and managed to ask, "We're doing it then? We're gonna go for it?" Ratchet swallowed and nodded as he patted his friend's shoulder before looking over at Perceptor. The mech was still barely conscious and had rolled onto his side. He was curled up tightly, cuffed hands gripping his helm while he looked dazedly at the metal floor beneath him, optics tracing the slight bounce of a pebble as the ship roared through the sky.

Ratchet ran his fingers over his helm and pulled Perceptor's hands away to expose the sizeable dent he'd been covering up. He pulled a data transfer line out of his wrist and carefully plugged it into a port on the telescope's neck. Following the textbook procedures for assessing a processor injury, he ran a scan, carefully watching the readouts as it played across the inside of his optics. Reviewing the strict process helped to keep everything else blocked out and he vaguely noticed that his hands had finally stopped shaking. He sighed in relief as the scan came back better than hoped for. Perceptor was dazed and would be suffering from a slagging awful headache, disorientation and balance issues until the dent could be fixed, but not permanent damage had been done.

"You with us Perce?" he asked and gently tapped the mech's cheek. The red mech's optics brightened and he looked up at him groggily, like someone who had just woken up from a long nap. He mumbled incoherently before letting his helm flop back against the floor, optics shuttering closed. Ratchet sighed as he looked at the small mech. About ten vorns younger than anyone else at the University, he was already a senior and was—had been set to graduate with Ratchet and Wheljack in a week. Even though he was barely out of his youngling stage, he was already considered one of the most brilliant students at Praxis, but to Ratchet, Wheeljack, Lunar and Roadflare, he was the baby of the group and always would be. Ratchet had already seen two of his friend's grey bodies today—there was no way he was leaving a third behind to the mercies of those who had killed them.

Ratchet gently scooted his hands under the smaller mech and lifted, only to feel something in his back shift and snap with an audible crack. Ratchet howled and fell down to his knees, even as he held laid Perceptor down. Agony blossoming from his back struts to the lower half of his body and instantly, he knew they weren't just dented. One of his struts must have finally snapped after being bent so badly and in any other situation, it would be a simple matter of getting it welded or replaced, but as it was, he could already feel his legs going numb as the sensors deadened to save him from the pain.

The ground under him rumbled and jolted before coming to a stop and Ratchet's optics widened in panic. He barely had time to comprehend the tingle against his armor of an expanding force field before a loud crash sounded as the back of the shuttle was blown out.