Bringing the house down
It didn't take long for Jazz to return, this time with their weapons in hand. "Raided a locker an' found 'em." He said shortly, giving the twins back their guns. But the energon smears on his arms and carbon scoring along his sides told a different story. Sideswipe and Sunstreaker declined to comment however, deciding it wiser to leave the questions until later. Much, much later.
Jazz took point, half hunched as they dodged past guards and patrols. The wailing alarms had been silenced, but warning lights still flashed a vivid blue at every door and intersection, and armed mechs ran everywhere.
At one point, the black and white stopped and started running his hand along the purplish metal walls.
"What are you looking for?" Sunstreaker asked, leaning in to help look while Sideswipe kept watch.
"From th' schematics, th' generator room should be on this level, just in th' next compartment. Common fault in most outposts built like this isthatthe main power lines run just behind th' walls." Jazz replied. "Gotta find one so we can take out th' rest o' the guards. Ah, here we go. Hold this." He gave Sunstreaker his gun and proceeded to cut through the exterior plating of the wall with his knife.
When he had cut away a section large enough to put both arms through, he reached in and pulled out a loop of cable as thick as Sideswipe's arm. He scraped off the insulating cover from the cable, then ejected the secondary power pack from the stolen rifle, setting it aside while he fiddled with a detonator that he had picked up while 'raiding' the locker. Jazz turned towards the twins. "You two should get outta range. This is gonna be tricky, an' I don't wanna risk ya."
The brothers complied, backing down the hallway and around a corner. For about five minutes they could hear the Porsche working on his plan, whatever it was. All of a sudden the lights dimmed, but before either twin could remark on it there was a sharp detonation and the crack of an energy discharge. Blast doors started slamming shut further up the hall, then the lights died completely. Emergency lights flickered into life, wan and sickly.
"We're clear guys." Jazz called.
Warily, the twins emerged and slunk down the corridor to where they had left the black and white, the weak red lights casting strange shadows across their armoured forms. Jazz was waiting for them, standing in the middle of the main hall, a blown open containment door at his back and a huge carbon burn at his feet. Sideswipe glimpsed a number of charred body parts and the remains of the power cable pushed along the wall.
"What did you do?" Sideswipe asked curiously.
Jazz offered a half-shrug and took his gun back from Sunstreaker. "It'll take too long to explain. C'mon, we gotta move."
They picked through the blackened ruins of the door and a checkpoint that had lain behind it, passing rows of empty laboratories, some with experiments still in progress. Evidently, someone had gotten word out about the prison break and hustled the scientists out of the danger zone.
Finally, they located the control room for the power core. Through the tempered glass windows they could see the banks of energy coils, raw electricity arcing between the two story towers of pulsing coils. "Controls are locked down." Sideswipe reported after a moment's worth of random button pressing.
"Looks like it's been transferred to the command centre." Sunstreaker added.
Jazz surveyed the room, lips slightly pursed in thought. "Well, looks like we're gonna have t' take Caps' advice for this kind o' situation." He announced.
"And what's that?" Both twins asked.
Jazz grinned tightly. "If in doubt, break whatever looks most important." He pointed to a panel marked 'Thermal Dampening', then out the window at its corresponding apparatus. "That'd be pretty important, doncha think?"
The sabotaging itself was quite simple. Sideswipe smashed the window in with his fists and Jazz leaned out, carefully lining up his gunsights with the large high pressure pipes carrying freon gas back to the cooling plant. Sunstreaker meanwhile, busied himself with bypassing the security on their escape plan- an emergency evacuation chute leading to the outside walls. They'd have to hit the ground running but if the plan worked, everyone else would be too busy to worry about three battered Autobots hi-tailing it out of there.
"Ready yet?" Jazz asked. Sunstreaker crossed one final wire and the grate covering the chute hissed open.
"We're good to go." He replied.
"Alright, get ready for some fireworks."