Introduction: This chapter happens during Many Voices chapter 79 and ends right when chapter 80 starts. I don't think it contains any serious spoilers, but it'll make more sense if you read it right after chapter 79.

"Go!" Jazz shoved Orion toward the bridge. He didn't look like he wanted to leave, but fortunately, Soundwave grabbed him and pulled him through.

Then the enforcers opened fire. Jazz didn't have time to think before something crashed into him from the side, knocking him away from the groundbridge. It was that stuck-up Praxian, and for an instant, he thought that Prowl had turned on them. By the time he'd hit the ground and rolled behind a pile of boxes, he realized the other mech had probably just been trying to get him out of the line of fire. He got to a kneeling position, and saw that Prowl was already kneeling, with a gun in hand, and aiming—not at the other enforcers, but at the groundbridge.

He fired, and hit the controls. Another shot—a stray one from the stairs—hit another part of the bridge, and it exploded, sending shrapnel and debris flying across the room. Jazz and the Praxian enforcer were mostly shielded by the boxes they were crouched behind.

The feedback in Jazz's audios faded slowly, as he analyzed the situation.

They needed to get somewhere safe or they'd be caught as soon as the smoke cleared.

The nearest exit was the passage that led out the back, but he couldn't open that door without someone noticing—it was enormous.

There was one other passage that led out of the basement. It was on the other side of the room, though. Jazz could probably get there without any of the enforcers seeing him, but he didn't think he could bring Prowl with him.

"Did those last two get through?" one of the enforcers said.

"Don't know, sir. I didn't see."

Jazz glanced at the Praxian. Prowl had his optics shuttered, and a look of defeat on his faceplate. He was injured too—one of his doorwings looked like it had been hit full-on by a plasma blast. It wasn't leaking, but it looked burned pretty badly.

There were too many enforcers for Jazz to fight them off, and he thought he could hear more coming down the stairs.

"Search the room."

"What's going on?"

"They got through the bridge, most of them at least. There might still be two hiding in here somewhere."

"No, what was that noise?"

"Their bridge exploded."

"What? We need the coordinates from that so we know where they went."

If he tried to help Prowl, they'd both be caught. He still didn't trust the mech, much less like him. Perceptor was a much higher priority.

But he couldn't just leave this mech here to get caught. He reached out and tapped Prowl's shoulder. The Praxian un-shuttered his optics.

Jazz mouthed "follow me" and crawled toward the larger exit. Prowl had shown up to warn them, then shoved Jazz out of the line of fire. He couldn't just abandon the mech.

Miraculously, they made it to the door without being seen, but he was going to need to stand up to open it.

"Okay," he whispered, so quiet he was pretty sure only a Praxian would be able to hear. "I'm gonna open this door and you're going ta go through and run and keep running. I'll catch up. Three… Two…"

Jazz stood and yanked the door open.

"Hey!"

"Don't move!"

Jazz darted through the doorway and caught the door before it could open fully, using it as a shield as Prowl came through. Then he slammed it shut again and locked it. He could hear Prowl running ahead of him. There was a hidden door in the tunnel too, that led to a passage that looped around.

That was good, because they'd never make it to the end of this tunnel without being overrun. He noticed a drop of fresh energon on the ground and realized that the other mech must have been hurt worse than he'd thought.

He caught up with Prowl just as they reached the branch-off.

"Stop!" he said. He could hear banging coming from down the tunnel where the door was. Prowl skidded to a stop and leaned against the wall, venting hard. Jazz searched in the darkness for the panel that was hiding the side passage.

There.

He pulled it open, and beckoned Prowl in.

The tunnel was filled with light and sound for a moment, after the enforcers managed to get the door in the basement open, but Jazz pulled the panel back into place and the noise was muted again.

"Keep going," he said. "Follow me."

He led the way through the darkness at a walking pace, grateful to whoever had built Perceptor's house with so many escape routes.

Once they were back in the building, they crawled through the secret tunnels to a small storage room with a secret back door.

There, he stopped and got out an orb-shaped lantern.

"Sit down."

"According to my locator, we've come back to the professor's house."

"Yep," Jazz said. "We left Perceptor behind, and I've gotta get him out. Ya doin' ok?"

"I'm fine," Prowl said.

Jazz turned on his lantern and sat down with his back against the closet doors. He adjusted the brightness as the Praxian carefully lowered himself to the ground in the other corner.

Jazz shuttered his optics, and took in a deep, calming vent. Since he'd joined Autobot, some interesting things had happened, but this was the most exciting one by far. He had to try very hard not to be happy about it.

"Ok," he looked up again. Prowl had been closer to the exploding groundbridge. It seemed not all of the shrapnel had missed him. He had a few pieces embedded in his armor, and one gash that was leaking down his arm, but it didn't look too bad. His doorwing looked really painful, though. "Ya ought ta be safe here. This storage room's in an out-of-the-way kinda place. I'm gonna go find Perceptor. If ya hear anymech outside these doors behind me, just back up inta the passage and close the other door. Got it?"

Prowl un-shuttered his optics and glared at him.

"Ya're welcome for saving your life, by the way,"

"I would have managed," Prowl said through gritted denta.

"Then I guess I shouldn't have bothered," Jazz carefully maneuvered over to the door in the back of the storage room and slipped through. "If I'm not back in a joor, ya'll have ta find a way out without me."

Prowl didn't answer, so Jazz left him there with the lantern.

He crept through the passageways and ventilation shafts, frying Red's cameras as he went, so that by the time they hacked into the computers, they wouldn't be able to pull up any data from the secret passageways.

He got to Perceptor's lab, which was quiet. Through a crack in the wall, he could see that a table had been overturned and there was all sorts of scientific equipment strewn across the floor, but Perceptor wasn't here. Pit.

Jazz kept looking, starting at one corner of the house and working his way toward the other. He found them in the meeting room—Perceptor and six enforcers. The professor himself, was sitting at the table, wearing stasis cuffs, and with a deep, painful-looking dent on his faceplate.

"I've said what I'm going to say," he insisted.

"And I've warned you." One of the enforcers was sitting across the table from the professor. "I'm not going to be asking nicely for much longer. Where did that bridge go? What were the coordinates?"

"I don't know," Perceptor said. "I wasn't there."

"Even if you don't know the specific coordinates, surely you know where Autobot is hiding now? You must know all of the places they might hide."

"I do not," Perceptor said calmly. "I was merely hosting them. I don't know their plans or where they might have gone, or anything else. I have told you everything."

The enforcer stared across the table, then shook his helm. "I'm not buying it, Prof. You have two breems while I go find something suitably acidic in your lab. Think about what that means, and maybe you'll reconsider whether or not you can help me."

The enforcer left the room.

Pit.

They needed to get Perceptor out. Jazz could get out by himself with no problem, but he had an injured Prowl and a soon-to-be injured Perceptor to drag with him. He wasn't sure which was more of a liability.

He could probably take the six guards in this room, but not before at least one raised the alarm, and he estimated that there were about thirty of them in the house. Thirty enforcers. The Council was done playing.

Jazz didn't stick around to see what happened when the enforcer came back. If he could get Prowl out now, he could come back for Perceptor.

He took a different route down to the storage room Prowl was in, so he could kill more of the cameras as he went. He'd almost completely taken Red Alert's security system out by the time he got there.

Prowl hadn't moved at all, and he didn't look up from the soft blue light of the lantern as Jazz slipped past him into the room.

"Okay," Jazz said quietly. "Here's the thing. I can probably find a way ta get ya out of here. Once I do, ya're gonna need ta…"

"What about the other mech?"

"I'll come back for him."

Prowl shook his helm. "It's too risky. By now they will have surveillance all around, and there's no way anyone could leave without detection."

"I can do it," Jazz said.

"I doubt that."

"Well, would ya rather I leave ya here?"

"I would rather you not do anything rash," the Praxian glared at him. "And just wait until I can come up with a plan to get all of us out."

Jazz raised an optic ridge. "Excuse me?"

"And I would appreciate it if you didn't distract me."

"Do ya even know the layout of this house?"

"Yes."

"How about the network of passages through it?"

Prowl frowned.

"Then…"

"Stop," Prowl said.

Jazz opened his mouth to say that Prowl was not in charge here, when Prowl leaned forward and grabbed his arm.

"Someone's coming," he hissed.

Jazz shut his lip plates and listened. Sure enough, footsteps approached their hiding place. Jazz grabbed the orb and shut it off, then indicated for Prowl to climb into the passage. Prowl shot him another glare before doing so. His injured doorwing scraped the corner of the secret doorway and he flinched away from it with a quiet gasp.

"Go, go!" Jazz hissed as the footsteps neared, and the two chatting enforcers approached the supply room. Prowl climbed into the passageway and Jazz followed and shut it just in time to hear the door on the other side open.

"Nope," he heard. "Nothing in here. Wonder why there are so many empty rooms and closets in this house."

Jazz waited, but though he heard footsteps receding, he never heard the door shut. Frag it. There was a camera in that hallway that pointed right toward the supply room.

They'd have to find somewhere else to wait. Somewhere besides this cramped passageway.

"They left the door open," Jazz said quietly.

"I know that," Prowl said, sounding strained.

"We can't go close it, there's a camera. Keep crawling forward, we'll go somewhere else."

He heard Prowl moving up ahead, and followed, frustrated at the slow pace the other mech set. Eventually, he steered them to a decently large tunnel that ran alongside a wall on the ground floor. Again, Jazz pulled out his orb lantern and set it on the ground, then sat down in front of it. Prowl sat opposite him, reaching out to rest a trembling hand on the wall, as if to steady himself.

"Hey, mech…"

"My designation is Prowl."

"That doorwing, uh… looks like it hurts."

"You think so?"

Jazz tried to ignore his condescending, sarcastic tone. "I can help stop the pain if ya want."

Prowl, unsurprisingly, just glared at him.

"Really," Jazz said. "It might be a while before ya can get medical help."

"Whatever it is you intend to do, I'm sure I'm better off without it."

"But…"

"You are not coming anywhere near my doorwing," Prowl said. "I can manage."

"Okay," Jazz said. "I was just trying ta help, mech."

"My designation is Prowl. And I would appreciate it if you would stop talking."

"Ya know, if we're gonna be stuck here together, ya might as well try ta be a little more polite."

"No," Prowl said. "You might as well try your very best to be quiet so I can think up a way out of here in peace and we can stop being stuck here more quickly."

Jazz huffed. "Why is it your job ta come up with a plan?"

"Because I'll come up with a better one than you will."

"What!"

"Don't shout, someone will hear us. You might not like it, but it's the truth and the longer you argue with me the longer we will be here."

"Ya really think that, do ya? You arrogant…"

"Insulting me, despite what you might think, does not help me concentrate."

"Fine then!" Jazz said. "Come up with your stupid plan if you like. I'll just be over here, hacking inta the frequencies those enforcers are using so I can figure out what the pit is going on."

"You can't do that," Prowl said.

"Why not?"

"And it wouldn't help anyway. Anything on those frequencies will be heavily encrypted."

"So?" Jazz said. "I can decrypt them."

"With what computer?"

Jazz tapped the side of his helm.

"You can't do that," Prowl said.

"Yes I can!"

"I keep telling you not to shout," Prowl said quietly, glaring. "They will hear us eventually. If you can't control your temper, then you're going to get us caught and there will be nothing I can do about that."

"Then maybe you ought ta shut up!"

"Exactly. That's what I've been saying. We need to stop talking." Prowl said, then looked down at the lantern.

Jazz nearly spoke again, then sighed and crossed his arms instead. He wanted the last word, but he knew when he was beaten. So he decided to settle for proving Prowl wrong about the enforcers' communications. In the silence, he could hear what might have been faint screaming.

Better not to think about that.

He just hoped they didn't take Perceptor out of the house, because rescuing him from here was going to be easier than trying to follow them.

Jazz cleared his mind with some effort and started trying to figure out what frequency the enforcers were using. In about fifteen breems he had found it and it took ten more to filter and decrypt the messages on it.

"So," he said quietly to Prowl. "Did ya come up with a brilliant plan?"

"Several," Prowl said. "But I don't trust you enough to pull them off."

"Well, I've hacked inta the enforcer communications," Jazz said. "And in a few breems, I'll have made my way through the communications block they've got all over the house and I'll be able ta send Orion and Soundwave a message."

"Really?"

"Yeah," Jazz said. "I can tell ya what they're saying ta each other over the comm. if ya don't believe me."

"Can you send them a message?"

"Uh… yeah," Jazz said. "But that'd make it kinda easy for them ta find us."

Prowl shook his helm. "Let me rephrase. Can you send them messages so that they think they're talking to each other?"

"Ah…" Jazz said. "That might be a bit trickier, but I think I can pull it off."

"Are you simply saying that, or can you actually do it?"

"Look, I wouldn't say it, if I didn't think I could do it. It'll take some time for me ta figure it out."

"Do you know where they're keeping the professor?"

"His designation is Perceptor, and I did see him, but I don't know if he's in the same place."

"You should verify that," Prowl said. "We'll want to take him out the nearest exit."

"No," Jazz said. "We want ta take him down through the bottom of the building ta the lower levels."

"That's what they'll expect," Prowl said. "I think we should take him out the front door."

"What?" Jazz said. "That's insane."

"It's our best chance. You will have to trust me."

"I don't trust ya."

"Would you like to hear the gist of my plan? Or are you going to keep arguing with me just because you don't like to be wrong?"

"I am not… fine, talk."

Prowl explained his plan while Jazz listened. It was, after Jazz heard it, actually a pretty decent plan. Still insane, but in a good way.

Jazz went back to listening to the enforcers talk to each other, and Prowl went back to sitting with his optics shut, looking tense. After several more breems, Jazz discovered that Perceptor had been taken down to the first floor, which was even better for Prowl's plan. He memorized all of their voices and figured out a way to send fake messages between them.

"They've stopped," Prowl said at length.

Jazz looked up. "Huh?"

"I believe they've stopped interrogating your friend. At least… I can't hear it anymore."

Jazz took in a deep vent and let it out slowly. There was nothing he could have done. At least they could be sure to get him out.

"Do you know how many there are guarding him?" Prowl asked. His matter-of-fact tone wasn't helping Jazz like him any more.

"Five."

"Too many," Prowl muttered.

"Maybe…"

"If even one of them manages to contact…"

"I know," Jazz said. "Ya don't have ta explain things ta me like I'm some kinda sparkling."

"In about a joor and a half, the sun dome will shut off," Prowl continued. "They might have fewer mecha guarding him during the off-cycle, so that might be a good time."

"What if they take him out of the house?"

"Are you listening to their comm channels?"

"Yes."

"If they decide to take him somewhere else, let me know and we'll change the plan. But they probably won't. Perceptor is a well-known and well-liked professor at the Academy, isn't he? If he just disappeared, that would be suspicious. But if there was an accident in his lab and he died…"

"How can ya talk about that like it's nothing?" Jazz demanded.

"We're racing the clock," Prowl continued, as if he hadn't heard. "But if he's still alive now, he'll probably be that way at least until sunrise. Probably…"

"Who are ya talking to?"

"I don't know," Prowl's doorwings flicked angrily and he looked down, grimacing.

Jazz leaned back against the wall of the passage. Astroseconds ticked by slowly. Prowl seemed content to sit in silence, staring at the lantern.

Jazz was used to getting along with nearly everyone, but this mech might be one of the exceptions. That didn't mean he wasn't going to try, though. And he had a couple of questions.

"Hey, Prowler or whatever ya wanted me to call you."

"It's Prowl."

"Whatever. I wanna know something."

"Oh really?"

"I'm a wanted criminal," Jazz said. "We've established that. I oughtta be in jail at the very least, and Primus knows they could pick and choose what they wanted ta execute me for."

"I am well aware of that," Prowl said. "If our circumstances were different, I would do the world a favor and arrest you."

"Yeah, but…" Jazz said. "Back in the basement, ya could have just jumped through the bridge and left me ta get shot by those other enforcers."

"I could not have simply gone through the bridge. They would have followed and the whole exercise of sending everyone through would have been pointless."

"So ya intended ta get left behind?"

Prowl didn't answer.

"Someone would have had ta stay behind, wouldn't they?"

"There wasn't much time to think about it…"

"But ya shoved me out of the line of fire…"

"That's just programming. I'm an enforcer."

"…and then turned around and shot up the controls…"

"Which was a logical thing to do. I didn't want them to be able to find out where the others had gone. I'm sorry I didn't think to shove you into the bridge. Then I'd have had some peace and quiet."

"Yeah, and ya'd have been caught."

Prowl frowned.

His doorwing must have already been hurt by the time he and Jazz had gotten out of the way. He'd never made a sound though. He'd just gotten up and shot the controls. Despite Prowl's general unfriendliness, Jazz couldn't help feeling a grudging respect for him. "And what do ya mean by programming?"

"Enforcers are trained to protect other mecha."

"Including wanted and highly dangerous criminals?"

"You'd rather I let you get killed?"

"I just wanna know why ya didn't."

"Why?"

"Because we've gotta talk about something, Prowler. I'm not just gonna sit here in silence for the next three joors."

"I would prefer it if we did. And I don't know how many times I have to tell you that is not my designation."

Jazz shook his helm. "And why did ya come warn us in the first place if ya dislike us so much?"

Prowl let out a shaky sigh, and didn't say anything.

"If ya really disapprove of the rebellion, and ya really wanna arrest me, then why are ya helping us?"

"As much as I hate to say it, the Council is corrupt. I reviewed all of the facts that were available to me and determined that it would be inappropriate for me to allow you to be arrested and killed."

"Even me."

"No, just Orion and the others," Prowl said. "Those of you who haven't committed any serious crimes."

"Ouch. Are we not counting treason as a crime?"

"In this case, no."

Silence fell for a few moments. Then Jazz posed another question. "What are ya gonna do if we get out of this? Join Autobot."

"If I can." Jazz thought he saw a hint of worry in Prowl's expression. "If they let me. If not, I'll just let Orion know that I'm a resource he can call upon."

"Why wouldn't we let ya join?"

Prowl didn't answer.

"Mech, they let me join."

"I noticed. I suppose they must have come to trust you somehow." He narrowed his optics as if to say that he wouldn't be making the same mistake.

Jazz shrugged and looked away. He was still honored and amazed that Orion had let him join, and that Soundwave had backed him up. He didn't deserve their trust. He wasn't even certain he could trust himself.

"It's my turn to ask a question," Prowl said.

He was going to ask Jazz something about Quantum, wasn't he? Well, Jazz didn't have to answer if he didn't want to.

"Why didn't you leave me in the basement?"

Jazz looked up. Prowl was staring into the lantern, looking vaguely miserable. "What?"

"Why didn't you just leave me there? You saw I was injured. I was a liability. I'm sure it would have been easier for you to get out without me."

Jazz followed Prowl's gaze to the lantern. The frightening truth was that he had run through that very logic in his own mind down in the basement. He'd nearly left this mech to the mercy of the enforcers.

"Don't tell me it's because it was the 'right thing to do' because I've known good mecha who leave each other to die in the heat of the moment. Especially when they dislike each other. And you're not a good mech."

Jazz wondered if Prowl had left someone in danger or if someone had abandoned him.

"Why?" Prowl said again.

"Ta tell the truth, I don't know," Jazz said. "I just… well, ya'd just saved my life, I figured I owed ya."

Prowl nodded, as if he thought that was an acceptable answer, and the slight vulnerability on his faceplate disappeared so completely Jazz thought he had imagined it.

"Just so ya know," Jazz said. "I really didn't escape from jail. Actually, the Council offered me a job. They wanted me ta infiltrate Autobot and help them take it down." He smirked. "But I never had any intention of doing that."

Prowl frowned.

"So they're probably not real happy with me at the moment. And if ya turn me in, they'll kill me."

"I'm well aware."

"And I'd deserve it," Jazz said. "So I'm not gonna try and talk ya out of arresting me, but what Orion's doing is important, and I gotta help him, so… can ya wait until the resistance doesn't need me anymore?"

Prowl stared at him for a few astroseconds, then shook his helm with a sigh. "I'm fairly certain I won't have the authority to arrest you after this. And if I turned you in, I would have to turn myself in as well."

"Guess that's true," Jazz said.

"I'll have to wait until this is all over. But I don't think you should be allowed to avoid the consequences of your actions just because you're currently working for a good cause."

Jazz nodded. "Can't argue with that. And like ya said, I do deserve ta be executed. So… some orn, ya get your wish. For now…" he held out his hand. "Truce?"

Prowl narrowed his optics.

He probably doubted Jazz's sincerity. But he didn't understand. This was just another convenient distraction. Once it was done, Jazz would have to stop running from his fate again.

"Come on, Prowler," Jazz said, reaching his hand out a little farther.

Prowl looked as if he were considering it, then shook his helm. "I'm not going to shake hands with you."

Jazz leaned back again and sighed. "Fine."

"You know, you have yet to use my actual designation while addressing me."

"Yup."

"That's infuriating."

"I know."

Prowl huffed and looked away. Jazz's smile deepened. If you couldn't win them over, then driving them up the wall was the next best thing.

They sat in silence for half a joor. Jazz listened to the enforcers talking and Prowl just sat. The Praxian still looked tense. He was probably in a lot of pain. Jazz wondered if he should offer again to help.

"Hey, mech."

Prowl didn't move.

"I really can help with that doorwing."

Prowl shook his helm slightly, but didn't look at Jazz.

"Prowl?"

He looked up.

Jazz let himself smile slightly. "Look, we've still got more than a joor before we're gonna try ta get Perceptor out of here, and then who knows how long it'll be before we get ta a medic. Let me do this, all right?"

Prowl looked down.

"That's probably more than ya want ta trust me." Jazz said. "I understand that, but I really just wanna help. Besides, when we actually do try ta bust Perceptor out of here, you'll be more help if ya aren't in so much pain."

"Fine." Prowl said.

"'Kay," Jazz said. "Turn around."

"What are you going to do?" Prowl asked, obligingly turning his back to Jazz.

"It's gonna hurt a lot," Jazz said.

"I thought the point…"

"At first, then it's not gonna hurt anymore."

"What. Are. You. Going. To. Do?"

"I'm gonna cut the sensory cable, so ya can't get data from it, including pain. Ya won't be able ta hear out of it either. But I figure it's a decent trade-off."

Prowl hesitated. Jazz waited, giving him time to back out if he wanted.

"Do it."

Jazz shifted the lantern out of the way and scooted closer to Prowl. He got out a small, razor-sharp knife and set his free hand against the base of the other mech's doorwing. Prowl flinched and then stiffened.

"Sorry," Jazz said. "And sorry in advance. Try ta hold still." He cut away the casing at the base of the doorwing, just over where all the cables ought to connect. The wiring seemed to be a little more complicated than just an arm or a leg, and while Jazz's hands were steady, Prowl was shaking, so this might get kind of tricky.

Jazz passed the knife to his other hand and pulled a tiny hook out of subspace, which he used to move aside wires, looking for the one that he would need to cut. He was worried for a moment that he wouldn't recognize it, but then he found it.

"Here it comes," he muttered, then in one motion pulled it out of place with the hook and cut it with the knife in his other hand.

He'd been a little worried that Prowl would scream, and someone would hear it, but the Praxian just let out a choked whimper, then slowly relaxed. Jazz backed away as the other mech turned around.

Silence hung heavily in the atmosphere.

"Thank you," Prowl said.

"Don't mention it."

"You seem to have had some practice doing that sort of thing."

"Yup," Jazz said. "Friend of mine taught me that trick back when I was in Quantum."

"Dare I ask what you use it for?"

"Getting interrogated, mostly."

Prowl was silent for a few moments. "Ah… I see."

Jazz laughed. He tried to stop himself, but he couldn't help it, and he managed to keep it quiet enough that no one would hear him.

"What?" Prowl snapped.

"I don't know," Jazz said, after he'd calmed down. "Just the way ya said that."

Not that getting interrogated was a laughing matter. Jazz's thoughts were brought suddenly back to Perceptor, and he looked down.

They needed to get the professor out of here. First, Jazz ought to try and send a message to Soundwave. Trying to use standard frequencies would just get him caught, but if he used some really obscure one, Soundwave might never pick up on the message. He could get past the communications block they had put up around the house, but even so, it was just as likely that the enforcers would hear him.

Then again, Soundwave knew what Jazz could do. He might suspect that Jazz was planning an escape.

Cautiously, Jazz left a heavily encrypted, nearly untraceable comment on the Autobot site on the public database, and then waited, watching the site carefully. If they saw it and decrypted it, Soundwave would know exactly who was talking to him.

Less than a breem later, another comment showed up under it.

One word. Typical Soundwave.

"Status?"

Good. Jazz had his attention. "We'll still be here another joor. It would be nice if you could get us a transport or something. In all likelihood, only two of us will be capable of walking."

After half a breem, there was another comment.

"Where?"

Where for the transport? The front door would be nice, but they'd have to time it right.

"Could you have it two blocks north, then come meet us at the front door?"

Jazz waited.

"If you let me know when."

"I'll let you know."

Jazz watched for any other comments, but none showed up. And then a breem later, someone took the whole conversation down. Anyone who'd been watching that would be pretty confused, but they probably wouldn't guess what it meant.

Jazz leaned back against the wall. "You're welcome."

Prowl looked at him. "Excuse me?"

"I just got us a ride out of here."

Prowl raised an optic ridge, but didn't say anything. Jazz sighed. He really wished he'd ended up stuck here with someone who was a bit more of a conversationalist, and a bit less of an arrogant snob. Oh well. At least Prowl was a competent arrogant snob. And he wasn't so bad. Not as bad as Jazz had originally thought, at least.

A little more than a joor later, the number of guards personally watching over Perceptor went down to two, though they still had a strong perimeter set up outside the house, and were guarding the basement and both ends of the tunnel. Jazz led Prowl out of the room they'd been hiding in and through the passages in the walls.

There was one passage into the front room, where they were keeping Perceptor, and there was a crack in the wall that let Jazz see into the room. The professor was lying on the floor in the corner, with stasis cuffs on his wrists and ankles, and facing the wall. One of the guards was standing by the door, while the other sat in a chair at the table, sipping a cube of energon but nonetheless looking alert.

Jazz beckoned Prowl over to look through the crack as well. Then they backed down the passage a little.

"It's pretty well-lit in there," Jazz said quietly. "It's gonna be hard ta take them by surprise."

Prowl nodded.

"we gotta try, though. Ya can go for the one at the table, and I'll take the door one, all right?"

Prowl nodded again and un-subspaced a gun.

Jazz crept back to the secret door and rested a hand on it, ready to open it.

Then he sent simultaneous messages to all of the enforcers throughout the house in a way that made them think they were being sent from a superior officer. "The Autobots are coming through the tunnel in the basement! All units not guarding the prisoner get down here to help, now!"

The guard at the table looked up from his energon, then—and Jazz thanked Primus for the luck—he stood and walked over to join his friend at the door. Both of them looked out into the hallway for a moment.

Jazz pushed the door open and slipped into the room. He raced toward the guards. One of them turned around, and Jazz heard Prowl fire his gun. The blast took the unsuspecting enforcer in the faceplate, and Jazz crashed into the other one, unsubspacing a stun knife and slamming it into the side of the mech's helm. The enforcer went down, and Jazz knocked the other one unconscious as well, then stood up.

"That was neatly done," Prowl said.

"They're just stunned," Jazz said, heading over to check on Perceptor. "If they have them monitored by a medic, he'll read all their vital signs as normal, and they'll come to in about five breems. Gives us plenty of time, and no one'll suspect." He knelt down. "Hey, Percy, can ya hear me?"

Perceptor didn't move.

"I don't think we have time to get the cuffs off," Prowl said, coming over. "I can carry him."

"Okay," Jazz said, then commed Soundwave. "Hey, mech, we wouldn't mind that ride about now."

Prowl knelt and picked Perceptor up. He was definitely unconscious, but Jazz didn't have time to check and see how badly hurt he was. He went ahead and got the front door open. It set off alarms, and he knew they didn't have much time before everyone figured out that there actually weren't any mecha from the resistance in the basement tunnel. Prowl jogged past him, out the front door, carrying the professor, and Jazz followed, letting the door close behind him.

A large transport came down the street and skidded to a halt in front of them. The door opened and Prowl jumped in. Jazz followed. In a few moments, the door was closed and they were speeding off down the street.