diff --git a/prometheus/scrape_configs.libsonnet b/prometheus/scrape_configs.libsonnet
index 4d6f6b446..5ddebae3f 100644
--- a/prometheus/scrape_configs.libsonnet
+++ b/prometheus/scrape_configs.libsonnet
@@ -255,6 +255,14 @@
     ],
 
     metric_relabel_configs: [
+      // Let system processes like kubelet survive the next rule by giving them a fake image.
+      {
+        source_labels: ['__name__', 'id'],
+        regex: 'container_([a-z_]+);/system.slice/(.+)',
+        target_label: 'image',
+        replacement: '$2',
+      },
+
       // Drop container_* metrics with no image.
       {
         source_labels: ['__name__', 'image'],