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The towering cliff rose sharply from the ground. Moonlight spilled down in a pale silver wash, casting an enormous shadow across the earth below. Now and then, a snake slipped soundlessly over the ground like Death itself, carrying a quiet message of mortality to the creatures of the night. Along the edge of the cliff, the rocks bore clear scars of laser burns, and drops of faint blue energon had splashed onto the ground. The chill in the air brought no sense of relief.
Two black-and-white frames lay curled in the shadow of the rocks, utterly still. The rhythmic sound of dripping energon crossed and overlapped, playing a countdown to life itself. Beneath them, the liquid had pooled into a shallow puddle.
Prowl clutched his partner tightly with his only remaining functional arm. Behind the calm surface of his optics, fury and killing intent churned, barely restrained.
“Easy, pal… those Cons wanted to drain us dry—cough—”
“I order you to stop talking,” Prowl snapped, tightening his hold instantly.
The other mech obeyed, settling into the strength of Prowl’s arm, reaching up as if trying to touch his helm. The strategist lowered his head without hesitation, and sure enough, a trace of a smile flickered in the single remaining optic that Jazz still had.
Jazz’s visor had been shattered by enemy fire, one optic destroyed. Three bullet holes gaped in his lower torso—Prowl could only press desperately against the largest one. Thankfully, the main energon line was intact. Black fingers traced slowly over the chevron on Prowl’s helm, the V-shaped crest broken at the tip. Behind him, the sleek door-wings were shattered as well. Prowl’s left leg had been severed cleanly by high-temperature laser fire. The ruined limb lay not far away, along with his torn arm.
Skyfire wouldn’t arrive until dawn. Until then, they had to stay conscious. The seekers could pass overhead at any moment. They couldn’t enter stasis lock, and they couldn’t be discovered by human forces.
“Prowler…” Jazz’s hoarse voice gnawed at Prowl’s spark like molten metal. Four hours until sunrise. They both knew Jazz could slip into shock—or lock—at any moment. Prowl suppressed the damage readouts flooding his vision. His energon level was under fifteen percent.
“Jazz. How much energon do you have left?”
“Cough… thirteen percent…”
Neither of them looked good.
If they combined their remaining energon, the recipient might last until rescue—but the donor would inevitably go offline. Prowl’s leg was useless. If danger came, he’d only be dead weight.
He ran the calculations anyway: the probability of Jazz escaping while carrying him—less than one percent. Jazz escaping alone—vastly higher. The comparison wasn’t even close.
Of course, that required Jazz to accept the transfer.
Prowl gently eased Jazz down.
“Pro—” Jazz tensed instantly.
Prowl soothed him with slow, impossibly gentle touches. Using his good leg, he carefully positioned himself between Jazz’s legs, making sure not to aggravate the abdominal wounds. Though Jazz gave no verbal response, the tension melted under the familiar touch. He didn’t even realize Prowl had opened his energon input panel.
With only one arm, Prowl couldn’t lower himself further—it would only worsen Jazz’s injuries. He opened his abdominal plating, drew out his main energon conduit, and connected it as gently as he could to Jazz’s energon port.
“Jazz… hold on…”
Before Jazz could answer, pale blue energon surged between them. Prowl’s white conduit glowed softly in the light. Jazz watched in stunned silence as his energon levels climbed rapidly.
When the numbers finally stopped at twenty-eight percent, the conduit was abruptly disengaged. A heavy thud followed.
“Stay alive…”
That was the last sound Jazz caught.
When he struggled upright, Prowl’s once-brilliant blue optics had gone dark—an ominous black.
No…
Trembling hands pressed against Prowl’s plate. But here, he couldn’t even scream. Optic-cleaning fluid wasted energon. Screaming wasted energon. Damn it—everything he wanted to do now went against Prowl’s intentions.
He clutched Prowl’s hand with what little strength he had left, as if letting go would make the body vanish. In the pitch-black corner of the cliff, all he could hear was the sound of his own energon dripping. Prowl’s energon levels had surely fallen to the very edge of survival.
Time passed—how long, he didn’t know.
When the glow of sunrise finally crept over the horizon, he heard the most beautiful sound in the world: the roar of a white spacecraft’s engines.
“Prowl… it’s morning,” Jazz murmured, pressing a kiss to the SIC’s helm as Skyfire looked on in alarm and Prowl slipped into stasis lock.
_________
Ratchet set down his wrench—Prowl would later insist this was a memory best left unexamined (those brave enough could request the footage from Red Alert). Prowl reactivated his systems and opened his optics, only to be hit with a wave of vertigo and nausea the moment he tried to stand.
“Aftereffects of critically low energon,” Ratchet said. “You should lie down and rest.”
“Thank you, Ratchet.”
Prowl braced himself against the wall and made his way to his office, beginning his day’s work with mechanical precision. His logic systems filtered out Ratchet’s protests from outside the door.
When his work finally ended and he returned to his quarters, the door hadn’t even closed before a black-and-white figure slipped inside. Prowl didn’t move. He waited.
“My dear Prowler, given that you were severely injured and still—”
“I transferred energon to you via a standard conduit so you could survive until rescue. The scenario you’re implying is neither logical nor factually accurate.” Prowl cut him off without hesitation. They were both Academy-trained—Jazz’s implication was perfectly clear to him, and just as clear was the fact that he had crossed no line.
Seeing that Jazz wasn’t leaving, Prowl turned, exhaustion finally catching up with him. In the next instant, a trembling frame was pressed against his chest.
“You’re alive… that’s really—really great.”
A brief warning flashed through Prowl’s logic circuits, but his arms closed around Jazz anyway.
Encouraged, Jazz looked up, a mischievous smile tugging at his mouth. “Then… how about we actually finish it this time?”
Prowl lowered his gaze. Jazz’s optics had been repaired; the new visor reflected Prowl’s own optics—deep, calm, and soft. Through the blue sheen, youthful warmth and energy shone unmistakably.
“All right,” Prowl said quietly.
_________
Despite how out of place Cybertronians still seemed on this organic planet, and despite the lingering confusion in the optics of Hound and Mirage, more and more Ark crew came to understand an unspoken rule: Saint Hillary Peak now belonged to Prowl and Jazz.
Whenever Jazz was away, the black-and-white Datsun would appear alone at the summit late at night, gaze fixed as if trying to pierce the darkness itself. And after that, whenever Prowl stood motionless before Monitor One, the large music player would, unusually, refrain from interrupting—waiting instead at the peak.
More often, though, two black-and-white vehicles sat side by side on the mountaintop, watching the eastern sky pale with dawn. Waiting for sunrise became a quiet promise between them. Or maybe a kind of romance—though Jazz would insist Prowl never really understood.
_________
Moon Base 1, Cybertron
“We’re expected to arrive by morning. Return flight will depart early the following day,” Prime said, listening to his SIC’s report. He nodded lightly, though the weight behind the gesture was immense. The war had burned for far too long, grinding down every soldier. These veterans had spent most of their lives on the battlefield, powerless to change their fate. This battle was only one more among countless others.
Prowl stood at the ship’s entrance, reviewing every detail in his mind. Once Ironhide, Ratchet, and Brawn were aboard, a familiar voice sounded behind him.
“When will you be back?”
Prowl turned. “The energon transport will return before dawn. I’ll remain in Autobot City for some time—the return schedule isn’t set yet.”
Jazz nodded, disappointment clear, but he understood. As Cybertron’s finest strategist, Prowl staying behind was a massive asset to Earth’s defenses.
Prowl drew Jazz into a brief, gentle embrace—then, without giving him a chance to respond, pushed him away and ran for the cockpit. That resolute back was the last image burned into Jazz’s memory.
_________
When the explosion tore through the air, Brawn fell before him. A laser punched through Prowl’s chest, his solid frame crashing to the ground. Strangely, fear never came. The only regret was that he’d never see them again.
The ground shook twice more—Ironhide and Ratchet. An overwhelming fatigue washed over him. His audio receptors could no longer distinguish the tyrant’s laughter from the enemy officer’s sneer. No matter how much he longed, how unwilling he was… it was time to rest.
His optics shifted from blue, to blazing red, and finally to black.
This time, no medic—no matter how skilled—could make those beautiful ice-blue optics shine again.
_________
Jazz still bore scorch marks from laser fire. His exhaustion was plain to see, yet he raised his right hand with all the strength he had left, saluting the line of coffins before him alongside his comrades.
One of them was black and white.
Inside lay the strategist, carrying emotions that would never be spoken.
Pain etched every face, but Jazz’s expression was eerily calm.
He lifted his head and looked toward the horizon.
Once more, the east was beginning to glow.