NorthStar had a rather rude wake up call as she was yanked out of her berth by a large orange mech.
"Get up scumbag and get moving!" He growled jabbing her in the side with an electric rod, making her jerk to her feet.
As she was marched down the prison halls past many other cells, the Cons who had been kept there looked almost sorry for her. She heard one of them whispering to the other: "TiltShift is going to kill that poor fembot." The Seeker who said that had a missing optic.
She was getting more nervous with every astrosecond, her wings started twitching as she entered a dimly lit hall, screams of other poor souls echoed off the walls making NorthStar whimper.
"You'll be too easy," the orange mech known as TiltShift snorted dragging the femme into an energon stained room, he strapped her down before removing the gag. "So you're a medic, huh?"
"And you must be an interrogator?" She mocked.
What came next was a sharp, piercing pain of being stabbed in the side with a pointy object. It made her yelp.
"Watch that mouth of yours," he snarled removing the knife. "Now, I've got a few questions to you NorthStar and there are two ways we can do this. One - you tell me what I want to know and I let you go, two - you be a stubborn piece of slag and I beat it outa ya."
She laughed at him.
"Hit me with your best shot."
The mech didn't seem to like that because she got prodded once again, the pain made her jerk around.
"What's your unit?"
"Unit of your dreams, jack-aft."
"UNIT!" He growled stabbing her leg and ripping the knife down making her whine loudly.
"Alpha T1!" She cried. She was lying of course but he wasn't going to know that.
A few joors and some holes in her wings later she was thrown into her cell, leaking processed energon from almost everywhere.
"See, easy," said TiltShift with a nasty smirk before walking away.
All she could do was praying she'd be repaired before bleeding out to offlining. She gripped her wounded side and hissed in pain curling up and whining. She despised this place and the people in it, yet for some reason she wanted to see him in the false hope that maybe he'd help her.
Outride was right about not liking the news about NorthStar's interrogation and his colleagues words only assured him in that. The mech called TiltShift was an infamous ex-wracker and interrogator known from his cruel methods, ruthlessness and sadistic tendencies. The guy was said to chop the fliers wings off so they could never fly again – that had pushed some seekers to the edge of their sanity. Outride didn't wish that to NorthStar. No bot were touching her wings! No bot!
Waiting for the right moment was long and painful but the prisoner's feeding time finally came and he could sneak inside the cellblock under the alibi of helping to distribute the energon ration. Wasting no time, he quickly handed small plates to the other prisoners but there was only one cybertronian that really interested him. In no time he was at he door to her cell.
"NothStar?"
Her wings perked up when she heard his voice, she turned to see him though her frame screeched in protest. Dare she say she was happy to see this pestering Autobot, with his cocky attitude and underlying tone of kindness to her? Even if Autobot medics had come to repair the major damage meantime, they hadn't stayed long having heard of how dangerous and vile this particular femme could be.
She slowly pushed herself up onto her peds tiredly walking over to him and using the wall as support.
"Hi there, Boy Scout. Came to see me again?" She chuckled softly with a meek smile.
The femme looked better than he had expected, thanks Primus a medic must have already take care of her wounds. Still, from the scratches and dents on her wings, legs and sides he knew she wasn't fine. Outride should have been worried or angry at that fragger who had dared to touch her but instead he just smiled at her.
"Of course I did. Didn't I promises you that?" He carefully stretched out his hand between the electro-bars intending to touch her.
She smiled softly.
"I guess you did, just where I'm from promises only last as long as it benefits the other bot." She watched his movements carefully but allowed him to touch if he pleased, after all she was at least going to try to play nice with him. "So what about this benefits you? Or did you just miss me that much?" She chuckled and her wings flickered.
Of course he wasn't about to admit that he thought of her, no, that would put him in the disadvantage so that was not a smart strategy to take. He gently moved his fingers down her white, metallic cheek and to her jawline. She didn't protest and that made him feel more confident than ever. With a hand on her chin now, he lightly pull her in to have her even closer to the buzzing, blue bars.
"I guess we could both give something to gain something else, what do you think?" He narrowed his optics slightly, his voice barely more than a whisper. "As much as I enjoy your presence here in the base, I don't have the means to keep you from harm. But perhaps I could help you..."
Her optics widened slightly as a curious look crossed her followed by a Cheshire grin.
"Oh really? And what would hypothetically be the plan to help me?" She questioned softly as her wings swiveled happily, her servo gently resting over his.
The touch of her hand felt cool on his armor, his optics wandered from her pretty wings to her face and back. He wasn't sure what was the expression he wore right now but his face-plate seemed to be hot as if overheating engine.
"I will ask for your transfer to another base. And the cuffs I'll put on you are gonna be damaged. How does that sound?"
He focused his gaze at her hand holding his. Her claws look sharp but he wasn't afraid. He reached out his thumb and skimmed it through her lip-plates teasingly and lightly, wondering what the femme would do next.
"Thank you," she said softly before her servo lightly rested on his cheek, she spotted two guards coming their way and acted like she was being punished lowering her stance to submission. "I'm sorry sir, I swear I won't do it again!" She whined as they passed.
Her sudden action brought Outride back to reality, he hadn't expected anybot to come this way but unfortunately he was wrong. And he didn't like being proven wrong.
He cursed silently as the guards took some interest in the two of them, whatever he had hoped for went to waste. With a sigh he played along of course: "You won't do it again, I assure you Con. I will be requesting your transfer and you won't like the place we will put you in," he wormed her with a fake anger in his voice. "They will know what to do with an insolent scums like you there."
The guards walked over.
"This one is causing troubles again, sir?"
"Indeed. Report this prisoner trying her tricks on the Autobot officer on duty", he order, "And I will go straight to the chief of security to request her transfer."
One of the guard nodded and soon both were on their way. Outride had to be going too, he turned to NorthStar to look at her once again.
"You owe me."
She gave a soft sigh.
"You act as if I could ever repay you. Thank you for everything. I won't forget your kindness," She whispered walking back to her berth and sitting down, there really wasn't much else she could do but wait and plan her escape. She wanted to do something for him but she didn't know how or why, it was just odd how kind he was to her.
On his way out of the cellblock Outride fought back the urge to chuckle. "Kindness," he thought, "did she really mistook my fascination for kindness?"
Nevertheless, it was a pity that soon she would be gone. And he didn't even have the chance to play with her sweet, sweet wings. He was really going to miss her.
The prison worked fast and got NorthStar's transfer papers filled out, she got qualified as a class 6 threat, not enough for her to be paid attention to, quite the opposite, they had specific orders to avoid as much interaction with the femme as possible. The next orn they were preparing to ship the prisoners to their new 'homes'.
NorthStar sighed waiting in her cell to either be given a glimmer of hope for escape or be dragged out by some mech she wouldn't know, she was hoping he'd show up, that he'd get her out. "Why am I putting so much faith in an Autobot?" She mused as she paced around her cell like a caged animal "I'll either get out or get killed, but I win however it goes." She thought as a ghost of a smile graced her lips.
Outride, as a well-informed officer, knew of course that this orn the prisoners transferring would take place, however he couldn't do much about the orders he had got earlier. Currently he ended up sitting in the office, filling the database and trying his best to finish this task on time unless he would miss his chance to see NorthStar for the last time.
His plan was simple, ten joors ago he had walked into the prison storage on the pretext of the Master Tactician's order to check if there was enough supplies for the smooth transfer procedure. Then he had used his inbuilt acid squirt weapon to melt the lock devices of few pairs of hand and wing cuffs. Now they looked just the same as a normal cuffs but the lock was not working properly. He was sure NorthStar would have no problem figuring that out and with her sharp claws she didn't really need a blade or melee weapon to take care of herself while escaping.
Meanwhile in the cellblock it was time to gather the Con prisoners selected for the transfer, the chief of security supervised the procedure herself.
Everything had gone smoothly and NorthStar was grouped with two other seekers who had also gotten the faulty cuffs and had been conversing with North in seeker while being walked out with only electric prods keeping them at bay.
As soon as the three were far enough from the prison they broke their binds and took off like bats out of Pit. They dogged the shots that were fired at them in a complex show of speed and agility, each one flying as if they were in perfect synch. Eventually the Autobots fired a heat seeking missiles and the Seekers split up, circling around before they flew directly for the prison. Then they pulled up just a brief moments before the expected impact with the wall. One of them didn't make it and crashed in a brilliant display of energon and flames, making a large hole in the south prison wing allowing for more prisoners to escape. The other missiles hit the walls of the west wing. It was utter chaos as prisoners made a brake for it, some of them being gunned down or recaptured, some transforming and driving in all directions.
"DECEPTICONS, TRANSFORM AND RETREAT!" Multiple Seekers bellowed and as the smoke cleared most of the prison was in ruin. Burnt corpses littered the ground along with multiple damaged Bots and Cons alike.
NorthStar got exactly what she wanted – the place she hated so much was no more. She looked back for a moment scanning for him before taking off. Maybe one day she'd see her little Autobot again? If he survived, that is.