Kup could feel the rough wall pressing against his wounds. He had about four escape plans, but at the moment, they all seemed like more effort than they were worth. He ran through the situation again in his helm. This so called "high security" cell wasn't very high security. There was a camera up in the corner, but the bars weren't energized and they'd taken his stasis cuffs off when they'd locked him up.

Everything was gone from his subspace, but he still had a knife in a compartment in his leg, not to mention some integrated weapons. If he could figure out how to get his weapons systems online without a medic or an enforcer…

He heard a muffled clang and a shout from somewhere nearby.

Well, that sounded promising. If there was some sort of fight, maybe he could slip out? He just had to figure out how to get the cell door open.

And that meant he had to go look at it.

Which meant he had to get up.

Primus, he was too old for this imprisonment thing.

He pushed against the wall a little, wincing as his back plating shifted. That fragging symbiot had sharp claws.

The fighting sounds had stopped. He'd missed his chance.

Oh well.

Kup settled back against the wall and shuttered his optics.

Then he heard a slow creak like a door being opened by someone who didn't want to sound suspicious. Halfway through, the creak sped up as if whoever it was had lost patience and given up on sneaking.

Kup un-shuttered his optics again and looked up as familiar figure stalked into view, scowling at him and brandishing an axe longer than she was tall.

He grinned. "Sweet Solus Prime!" he said. "Never thought I'd see you again, femme."

Her scowl softened a little and she rolled her optics.

"What happened to the hammer?"

"You want me to beat the bars in with a hammer?" Solus deadpanned. "That would make a lot of noise and take far too long." She pressed something on the handle of the axe and the edge of the blade glowed yellow.

Kup watched as she stepped back, then swung vertically with the axe and cut the lock off of the cell door. It creaked open and she entered. "Are you hurt? Can you stand?"

Kup reached out and let her pull him to his pedes. She wasn't being quite as friendly as he remembered. Was something wrong?

"You know," he said. "I could have gotten myself out."

"Uhuh," Solus's said. "Just shut up and let's get out of here. I have a mission with Prima to get back to."

Kup followed her out of the cell, grimacing. "What kind of mission?"

"The kind mortals don't need to know about."

Kup raised an optic ridge and they went through another door into a larger room strewn with unconscious guards. "If you say so."

"Shh," Solus said and Kup fell silent. He could hear distant running.

"You think maybe someone triggered an alarm?" he asked. "There's an army out there."

"I know and I don't want to kill them all," Solus said. "Come here." She swung her axe at the ground. It didn't even make noise as it sheared cleanly through the metal. And it only seemed to cut hairline cracks, despite the thickness of the blade.

Solus and her fancy magic weapons.

She cut a rough rectangle in the floor and then reached down and lifted it up. "Thought so," she said.

There was darkness beneath—a tunnel under the building.

Kup snorted.

"What?"

"You don't put a prison right over a bunch of tunnels. And can you believe they called the little cage I was in a high security cell?"

"Let's go," Solus said. "You might want—"

"Okay, okay." Kup lowered himself down and dropped.

"Wait!" Solus said, but it was too late.

Kup fell for long enough that he had ample opportunity to regret his rash decision. Then, after what seemed like eternity, he hit the bottom and rolled, twisting an ankle and denting an arm.

The dim light from the room above winked out as Solus swung into the hole, pulling the chunk of the floor back into place and hanging from it for a moment before dropping as well.

She landed on her pedes with a heavy clang and turned on her lights. "Kup?"

He got to his knees with a moan, and she pulled him to his pedes again.

"Are you all right?"

"That was a farther drop than I expected," Kup said. "But yeah, I'll live."

She huffed. "That was stupid. You know, I am shocked every time I hear you're not offline yet. Hold on a moment." She put a finger to the side of her helm to indicate she was going to talk over a comm. "We're going to have to change the rendezvous point because we ended up in some tunnel. Closest exit to the surface seems to be… the mines."

Kup wondered who she was talking to.

"Let's see… how about we meet in the coliseum? That is close, right? And it should be empty… all right."

Kup looked up into the blackness above. He couldn't see the ceiling.

"We should move," Solus said. "Can you drive?"

"Yeah, better than I can walk at this point." He transformed. "Lead the way o beacon of—"

"Kup."

"What?"

She sighed.

"Oh, come on, you know I'm your favorite mortal." Kup followed her down the tunnel. The rough, unpaved surface shook him, which aggravated his wounds. He hoped they didn't have to go too far.

"That's not saying much. Considering I haven't been on Cybertron for several thousand vorns, you're one of the few mortals I know."

They drove in silence for a few astroseconds. She was definitely less friendly than before. Wandering around the galaxy for a thousand vorns would do that to you, Kup supposed. Or maybe he was remembering her wrong.

"So…" he said. "How did you find out I needed help?"

"Someone sent a message to Yoketron about it," Solus said. "And he asked Maccadam whether he knew anyone in Kaon who might be willing to help. Maccadam, of course, knew I was on the planet and volunteered me to come rescue you."

"Well, sorry to ruin your orn," Kup said. "How is old Mac anyway?"

"You've probably seen him more often than I have," Solus said.

"He still runs that place in Iacon, doesn't he?" Kup said. "Mech ought to branch out. I don't know how he can work at the same job for so long."

"Well, most mecha eventually figure out what they want to do for the rest of their life."

"Guess I'm the exception to that."

"No, you've decided to be an eternal troublemaker," Solus replied, and he could hear just a little amusement in her voice. Good.

"How are the rest of your siblings?" Kup didn't want to let the conversation die. Besides, it helped distract him from his injuries.

"Same as always," she said. "Well… most of them. I… would ask how your friends are doing, but…"

"They're all dead," Kup finished for her. "Yeah. 'cept for Yoketron, and it sounds like you've talked to him more recently than I have. Unless you count your siblings, who are also my friends, sort of. Some of them at least. You know, you mecha should have stuck around instead of leaving us. What's off-planet that's more interesting or important than here?"

"We had to make sure the Quintessons were gone for good," Solus said. "And then after that… there really wasn't a reason to come back. It gets hard after a while, watching everyone else get old and offline."

"Yeah," Kup agreed.

"But you may be right. We… not all of us are online right now." Something in her voice made that seem more grim than usual.

"What brings you back to Cybertron anyway?" Kup asked, not sure if it was the right question.

"I'm not at liberty to say."

"Femme, you're a fragging demigoddess, who's telling you you can't say stuff to me?"

"My better judgment," she said, and he was pleased to hear a smirk in her voice. "I don't want the entire planet to know what we're doing, and you're the world's worst gossip."

"Hmph," Kup said.

He kept the conversation alive the rest of the way through the tunnels. Solus was stiff for a few more breems, but she started to relax as time went on. He even got her to laugh once. She'd been spending too much time alone, or with Prima who was as dull as a factory worker's paint job.

They reached the coliseum. The whole place was in shambles—doors knocked over, graffiti on the walls and ceilings, dried energon staining the floor.

They passed a couple of offline frames as well on the way to the arena.

And there, standing in the center of the broken stage was Kup's oldest living friend.

The slender mech faced away from them, arms crossed, staring up into the empty stands.

Kup transformed to root mode and limped over to stand by Yoketron.

"See?" he said. "Knew I'd find you in Kaon."

Yoketron turned to face him. He could see the stress lines on his brother's faceplate and the exhaustion in his optics.

"Kup," he said. "Are you all right? You're limping—what did you do to your ankle?"

"Funny story. I jumped down a hole and didn't look to see how deep it was first. Primus, mech, it's good to see you. I'm guessing you're fighting for the other side then?"

"In a manner," Yoketron said. "You should have commed me to ask instead of just showing up to join the Decepticons."

Kup's optics widened. "Oh… yeah, that would have been smart."

Yoketron smiled and shook his helm sadly, looking out over the stands again.

"But I could have sworn you taught that gladiator."

"I did," Yoketron said. "Before I knew what he would become."

Kup crossed his arms, turning to scan the empty seats above and around them. "What exactly did you think a gladiator was going to become?"

Yoketron sighed. "It's a long… oh, Primus, your back."

Kup turned toward his friend again. "Why yes I am."

"No." Yoketron grabbed him by the shoulder and stepped around him. "What happened? This looks painful."

"Eh, it's probably not as bad as it—ow! Don't poke at it."

"Some of these gashes look deep…"

"It was some big cat symbiot thing."

Yoketron let go of him. "Ravage."

"Excuse me?" Kup said.

"Ravage. The cat's designation is Ravage."

"You… what?"

"You know," Solus said. "Between the two of you, you probably know the entire population of Cybertron."

"I trained that symbiot's owner as well," Yoketron explained.

"The faceless mech?"

"Yes."

"Did you tell him about me? Cuz he recognized me and knew my designation."

"He's a telepath."

"He… Yokes, you got a lot of questions to answer. A telepath?"

"Yes," Yoketron said. "We can catch up once we're in Iacon. Solus, is something wrong?"

Kup turned to see her frowning into the empty stands, optics narrowed, alert. She glanced over her shoulder once, pulling her giant axe from subspace, then looked at Kup and Yoketron. "Yes and no," she said. "Yoketron, can you get out of the city on your own?"

"I should be able to, yes," Yoketron said. "Why?"

"I sense something," she said. "Actually… just to be sure, I'll escort you out of here and bring Prima back with me. He's going to want to check on this place as soon as possible. Come on."

"What?" Kup said, wincing. "What the frag is going on?"

"We should take Kup to a medic before we drive to Simfur," Yoketron said.

That sounded like a good idea. The drive to Simfur could take an entire orn, and Kup didn't know if he could make it that far. At the very least, he needed some energon.

"No," Solus said. "We're going to cheat. I'll have Maccadam bridge us directly to Iacon. Come on, let's get somewhere more secure."