Redemption (Rated T) - A Pirate/Fleet RP

[Cyborg]

" Aww okay, no hacking. Oh, okay, but I don't have to like the guy. And I guess I volenteer, I know not to attack Fraze, I got it. Though I must know, is there any bit of earthy substance up here, I would need some sand at the least, for my offensive magic?" Cyborg asked as he grabbed his cutlasses, and prepared to follow Keng. " Lead the way."

[Kat]

"If you guys have some sort of a fullscale battlestations command here, then it'd be high time to use it."

Kat glanced up from the man who was still scared of her. Something was wrong. Something had happened, and she was too busy crooning over the sole survivor of the stampede who didn't like being prodded with a shining stick.

She stood up and followed the voice. Crouching down, she saw Bloody Mary - and Hunty. "Oh, shoot, Cap'n!" Kat exclaimed. "I'm so sorry, if only I came just in time..." Her staff shrank back into a wand, and the golden star atop it began to glow purple. Ribbons of light flowed from the star and into Hunty's back as Kat assessed the injury; magic would not be enough, but it would do for now.

"We need a paramedic. If I expend more power, I'll send myself into a coma. But more importantly, who the heck..." Kat looked around, searching for any suspicious figures and trying not to think of the remote possibility that Spacefleet could have set them up and sent an assassin in their midst...

[Rider]

[glow=red,2,300]Rider had a rough idea of what was going on. Like a blind woman, she walked, arms outstretched and eyes open wide.

"Kat, do you sense a demonic presence in this room?" More than anything, she wanted Shiva to be here... but more than anything, she wanted Shiva to be as far away from this deathtrap as possible. He had kids to think of.

Of course there must be other demons with Schzain's power. Of course Schzain wouldn't do something like this... Schzain was her friend, after all. She replayed thier last meeting in her head. Had the half-demon seemed colder than usual? More bitter? She couldn't remember.

"Be aware of your surroundings, people. Any sourceless breathing, any wind that comes from movement.

mentally, Schzain cursed herself. of course she should have gone for Red. Red knew her powers, the full extent of them. The demoness darted out of the way as one of Rider's hands nearly hit her. She was still solid as ever, after all. Nothing more she could do but find a safe hiding place and wait for her next chance.

Leraye watched the survaillance tapes with that same quiet smile on his face. His pursuers were none too bright, neither the human ones or the demonic ones. The barrage of hellfire continued to rain from the ever-starry skies.

So they thought he was the demon who could pluck the moon from the sky, did they? They were doing that well enough themselves. So they thought he had the power of a god at his fingertips? Well, perhaps that wasn't entirely false, but it was nothing compared to the power of their whole army put together.

But even villains need heroes. Achievers who have the brass and the fortitude to challenge the mighty.

He got up out of his chair and took a walk around the HQ, listening to the blasts from outside. That foolish Warmaster thought all he had to do was poke a hole in these impenatrable walls and all the air would be sucked into space, and that would be the end of all non-demons on the moon.

That was boring. Leraye would not allow things to be boring. He didn't allow for boredom when he betrayed TMC, and he would not allow for boredom now. These people who could cause problems for him, these pirates and that cyborg and these moon-men and those demons, what more elegant way to get rid of them than to let them get rid of each other?

He erected a magical barrier to keep the air inside. Slowly, he wore away at the wall from the inside. He weakened it, rearranged particles, being careful to keep the black gem safely in his pocket.

There, now it would be about five minutes before the army broke through. He could be safely on the other side of the Fleet HQ, watching the battle on survaillance camera by then. Not that he was so morbid as that, but he had to be certain that the pirate captain, the High Warmaster and the top leaders of Spacefleet were taken out.

What he didn't know was that a half-demon was watching him in the shadows, invisible. Also, two people were walking towards him on their way to the mess hall. A werewolf and a cyborg.

Leraye walked away as non-chalantly as possible, hoping that they didn't see him. They probably did. They wouldn't recognize him in his new disguise, though, right? [/glow]

[Amneiger]

Outside Spacefleet, the demons were making headway against the external defenses. The sheer number of demons and the fact that they had already made it to close range before the guns could begin to work on them meant that the defenses were taking serious damage. A few of the missile turrets had already collapsed, with their remaining ammunition detonating into massive fireballs. With some of the guns down, the demons attacking the main Spacefleet buildings were able to find a few protected spots away from the artillery barrage.

One of these spots happened to be just outside a small, unremarkable buggy garage. A small group of Spacefleet soldiers had been busy trying to fortify it against attack, and were slowly realizing that the banging on the doors seemed to be increasing.

"Defense, this is garage 98T. Can you see what's happening outside?"

"Give us a moment to move a satellite into position...It looks like there are demons regrouping around your position and they all decided that come in at once. What do you have right now?"

"Two heavy machine guns, some rockets..."

"Not enough for what we're seeing here. We're sending you backup. Make sure that all your troops have vacuum armor, and check that the bulkheads around you are airtight."

"Special Ops Fraze? This is the Defense center. We've got a imminent breach in garage 98T. We have some troops there, but they need heavy weapons. Expect vacuum conditions."

[Fraze]

Too many things, all crashing down at once. The civilians had nearly all evacuated to the mess hall--most of those that remained had seen where everyone was going, and were making their way there.
Then it looked like Hunty got stabbed. From the pirates' reaction, it was an invisible attacker.

Since cloaking was an important part of Fraze's own combat, he knew many different tricks to detect a cloaked attacker. Some of them were incredibly roundabout and baroque--such as sending sound waves through the floor to detect pressure differences where there shouldn't be any. With a mental twinge, he remembered finding that...biker...near the end of the last war, through that same means.
He quickly cycled through several different possibilities. Radar didn't work, there were too many other things for sonar to give anything conclusive. What about...
Fraze tried heat vision*, and blinked a couple times at the result. There, glowing bright white, was a humanoid figure, just barely avoiding Rider's flailing arms. With a movement perfected by reflex, Fraze flicked open the cartridge holder of his plasma rifle with one thumb, removed the BBs, and replaced them with full-sized rounds. As the figure turned to run, Fraze lifted up the plasma rifle and squeezed off a round. It left the gun with a sound that was something like drops of water falling onto a hot stove, speeding toward its target far faster than the eye could follow. Several people's heads turned to look at the sound.
He had aimed for the figure's back. This wasn't, or at least shouldn't be, a fatal shot--whoever it was might be able to answer some questions.
Before he could see the effect of the shot, a message chirped in his ear. He had told his suit to ask permission before playing any messages, which meant this must have been very high urgency. "Special Ops Fraze? This is the Defense center. We've got a imminent breach in garage 98T. We have some troops there, but they need heavy weapons. Expect vacuum conditions."
Great. "Understood," Fraze answered back. "I'll make my way there immediately."
"I can't wait to see if that shot hit," he called to the pirates in general. "If it did, the attacker should be sprawled somewhere between you and that pillar there. I'm needed somewhere else. Bloody Mary, I'm afraid the bus stops here. I'll be going into hard vacuum, and I don't think you'll want to be there."
To Ethan, he called, "Garage 98T is about to be breached, and they need me there. The medics should be here soon, make sure they get to that man over there. Good luck!"

Having said his goodbyes, Fraze took off toward the garage. He was running as fast as he could, while simultaneously dodging various civilians and other 'Fleeters. "'Scuse me, pardon me, REALLY need to get through here..."
Somehow, the route brought him past his quarters. When he got there, he paused and punched in the access code at lightning speed. Once inside, he leaped over what little furniture he had, coming to what looked like a small stone side-table.
Guns and such were fine for long-distance fighting, but he needed a melee weapon. He grabbed the Table by a leg and rushed back outside.
In a minute, he turned and skidded down to the garage. It appeared that he was the last person there, as everyone else turned to look at him. All of the people here seemed so horribly young. He realized that those of them who weren't gawking at his strange appearance were probably thinking similar things about him. Most of these people were large and bulky, while he himself was rather lean, with very little musculature. This effect was exaggerated even more by the fact that the group he was looking at was all wearing bulky hard-vac combat suits, while he was covered in what looked like little more than aluminum foil.
He had learned long ago that going out of his way to prove himself wouldn't accomplish anything, other than make him look desperate. Instead, he removed the Universal Box from his pocket, opened it, and held it out. "All right. You need weapons, they're here. Take anything you feel you can carry and use effectively, as well as plenty of ammunition. Anyone needing larger things, torpedoes and so forth, you'll probably need several people to carry them."

They all looked at him like he was mad.

Fraze sighed. "Come on, come on! This thing will breach any minute now. Here, look." He set the box on the ground and stepped in. Once inside, he again called out. "All right, everyone in! I can't get weapons for all of you."
Had the situation been less tense, he would have laughed at the reactions of the people there. He could see them from the entrance hole in the ceiling of the box, peering in. While they were looking dumbfounded, he ran to the nearest row and grabbed a rack of plasma rifles in each hand. By the time he hobbled back carrying them, several marines had already dropped down into the box and were looking around with a mixture of fear and wonder. By the time they saw the guns, he was already heading back to get more, as well as extra crates of ammunition. He helped himself generously to everything, clipping a dozen grenades and extra plasma and flechette cartridges to his belt. I'm going to ruin these slacks," he thought, looking down at the nice black pants he was still wearing from the diplomatic talks just hours ago. The bulk of the marines were down here now, some standing around gazing, others taking the time to load themselves up.
The whole process didn't take quite as long as Fraze had feared. In the end, they were all done in a couple minutes. He would have brought out some first aid kits, but if someone needed first aid in vacuum, there was nothing to do but either bring them back inside the station or let them die.
When everyone was out of the box, he himself climbed up the ladder out of the box, closed the box, and returned it to its place in his shoulder rather than put it in a pocket. He shouldn't need it for a while, and it would need to be safe in a combat situation.

There was a boom. And a hiss. The atmosphere rushed out of the garage. Fraze could feel it pulling on him, threatening to suck him away.
All outside sound disappeared, and he knew he was in vacuum. The experience was something like scuba diving. Your air was with you, you were perfectly safe as long as you stayed in your little protective shell. As long as you were in that shell, you could go places you never could before. But if the air stopped flowing, if that shell broke, you were in trouble.
He was not new to this feeling. He had spent many, many months of his life in vacuum, with nothing more than a few millimeters of exotic metallic polymers between him and near-instant death by simultaneous suffocation, freezing, and boiling.
If anything, this was his element.
((Removed the above portion due to a misunderstanding on my part.))

*"Heat vision" actually picks up infrared radiation. Anything with any heat in it--which is to say, anything and everything--radiates some light. The hotter something is, the higher the frequency of the most prominent radiated light. Humans and other warm-blooded creatures radiate in the infrared. On the other hand, this is why hot metal is "red" hot--its temperature is high enough that it glows in the visible spectrum.
This has been your science babble for the day.

[Rider]

[glow=red,2,300]((Fraze, Leraye put up a wall to keep the air inside. A godmode move on my part, and I didn't phrase it well in my last post, but Leraye wants to cleanly and efficiently see that all his enemies wipe each other out, not just the ones with shiny suits.))

Schzain had only barely avoided Fraze's attack. She managed to get into the garage before it was sealed off.

"We're almost in. Private Schzain, do you read me?"

"Sir, there are quite a few trained warriors with space suits, prepared for vacuum conditions on this side of the wall. Past here, though, it should be easy to open all the doors in Spacefleet and pop this place like a balloon."

"How heavily armed are they?"

"..... Sir, call me crazy, but one of the suited men jumped and disappeared. He seems to be passing up weapons from some rift in space."

"How heavily armed are they?"

"... Is that a freakin' torpedo?"

"Private Schzain, this is no time for jokes."

"Sir, you had best strike quickly before they figure out how best to use these larger weapons."

Indistinct muttering. Every time the shiny metal man popped out of the box, Schzain winced and hid behind the soldiers. So he could see her...

The garage breached with a blast that rang in the ears of all the warriors. Rang - yes, that was sound. And that fireball, that was real fire, not magic. Yes, it was consuming the oxygen in the room.

But how...

Quickly, Schzain drew her daggers and, at a weak point in the shoulder, stabbed one of the Fleet soldiers and broke his suit. She didn't even know if she injured him, or whether all the air is supposed to rush out of a broken suit or if it's all kept in the helmet. Her tactics were to hit and run.

Magical shields danced around the demon army, protecting against projectile attacks and responding to movement. Silently, Schzain wondered if they were fast enough. The pack - and now that the heat of battle had gotten ito them, they were more of a pack than an army - of demons were spilling into the room. As the battle heated up, many broke free of the pack and jumped ahead, confusing the magical shields. With a mid of thier own, they tried to protect everyone at once, occasionally even blocking magical demonic attacks that were aimed at Fleet soldiers.

Rider's ear was at the door. "We have to help them." Her captain was in no shape to help, never mind poor Jina. But it sounded like a titanic struggle in there. [/glow]

[Kat]

"Kat, do you sense a demonic presence in this room?"

"I do," said Kat. "Now that you mentioned it. I thought I was just feeling a little uneasy after that guy with the magic phobia. Stay close to me."

A few choice words were enough to create an invisible shield around her and her allies. It would protect against most magic attacks - most, because Kat didn't know much about demon magic. "Anything in particular you want me to do besides take care of defense?"

[Fraze]

((As in the latter part of the GW2 RP, when Fraze is cloaked, I will be writing in gray text.))

The fight began.
Fraze fired several shots, all of which were absorbed by seemingly nothing, before realizing he was fighting shielded enemies. This thought was echoed by radio transmissions from other 'Fleeters.
"What the--I just shot at that thing three times, and it didn't hit!"
"These rounds aren't working!"
"They should be vaporized by now!"

Clearly, a different approach was in order. Fraze grabbed the Table of Smiting from its place on his back. With a twist of one of the legs, two long blades sprung out of two opposite sides of the Table, running lengthwise along each edge. Fraze jumped above the heads of both 'Fleeters and demons, his jump assisted by his skinsuit. As he passed over one demon, he aimed a powerful swipe at its head with the Table. The reaction was immediate, as it fell to the floor. This drew the attention of the other demons near it, and they began to attack him. Several magical spells flew toward him all at once; he deflected two of them with a long sweep with the flat side of the Table in front of his face, and ducked to avoid the third.
"Engage the enemy in melee combat!" he called on the comm link. "Their shields only appear to be effective against projectiles."
Unfortunately, most of the soldiers there did not think to bring any form of melee weaponry. Fists worked to a point, especially reinforced with hard-vac armor. Some responded by using their newly obtained plasma rifles as maces. Fraze winced slightly when he saw this--but the guns were quite resilient, and it wasn't like he was running short on them.

One of the group of demons he had encountered stepped forward to try hand-to-hand combat. Fraze began with a simple swing of the Table at the demon's head, but this was quickly dodged. The foot...no one ever expects the foot. Using his momentum, Fraze pivoted his upper body downward, swinging a free leg up as a counterbalance. The intersection of human foot with demon jaw sent the latter party staggering backward, and Fraze finished the job with a slice with the bladed edge of the Table.

"Aaaaagh! Something just hit me from the side, but I couldn't see what it was!" came a pained voice over the comm link.
"I saw someone else fall like that, too!"
"We have a cloaked enemy here. Repeat, a cloaked enemy."

The next demon was about to close in. On a hunch, Fraze once again activated his heat vision. Nothing he could see, maybe the figure was hiding. If it was the same one he had shot earlier, it might have known about him. Then, perhaps it was hiding...
He was attacked once again. This one chose a magic attack; since he was distracted, it caught Fraze off-guard. The spell hit him in the center of his chest, and sent him flying several feet. He felt himself suddenly unable to move, as the metallic suit went rigid to act as impact armor. The crash landed him against some crates, which clattered on top of and around him. Digging his way out, he jumped up, though slightly dazed, and instinctively aimed a shot at the demon. It seemed to be outside its protective barrier, as it in turn went flying backward. An eye for an eye, and a fireball for a fireball. Or something like that. He grinned at this thought.
Back to the matter at hand. He cloaked, crouched, and jumped some distance above the heads of friend and foe alike. The demons attacking him looked around dumbstruck for a moment, but he didn't care about their reaction.
There. Right there, hiding behind crates. Glowing bright white, once again, was that figure, who looked much like the one he had seen in the mess hall.
Pausing only to toss a plasma grenade toward the group of demons he had been fighting, he took off toward the hidden one, doing his best to avoid any battles in the way.
Once directly behind her--he now believed the figure to be a "her," though since it was a demon he wasn't quite positive--he spoke. Perhaps not the best move, but he wanted answers. "Invisibility. A useful trick, isn't it? But it has its limits. I can see you, can you see me?"
He was taking a risk here, he knew that. Some magic users could apparently detect cloaked people by their auras. If this was one of them...well, his advantage would be gone. He kept his Table at the ready if this was the case.

[Zylaa]

In those first several minutes of panic, Zylaa was about as effective as a sheep. For all her time as a pirate, she came from a background of picketing and protests. Crusading against the evils of strong drink didn't usually lead to imminent death.

But after some invisible creature had stabbed Hunty, Zylaa snapped back to her senses. Sure, they were pinned in space, but that didn't mean they had to panic. After all, there was chaos here, but pirates loved chaos.

Zylaa followed Rider as she peered through the door. "We have to help them," Rider said.

"Agreed," Zylaa said fervently. "How to do that, though?"

As though in answer to her question, she heard Fraze's voice, faintly, over the sound of battle. Something about how the enemy were vulnerable to melee combat. Zylaa smiled, humorlessly. Here was something to do, then.

She slipped through the garage door, hoping that none would notice her. Of course, they didn't. They had their own battles to worry about, at the moment. Hopefully, that would change soon. Zylaa felt around in her pocket and found her spoon. Advancing towards the melee, she waved it in the air, so it caught the light of every magic spell and flashing shot.

Weasels popped into existance around her, peering up at the spoon, and out at the mess of battle. Zylaa decided to be as brief as possible.

"We're under attack," she said. "Get the demons, or they'll blow up the shiny fortress." Really gives a feel for the scope and urgency of the battle, she thought, briefly. Pocketing the spoon, and drawing her sword, she cried, "Attack!"

In a tide of white fur, the weasels swarmed under the crowd, past the 'Fleeters and towards the demons. Nobody ever looks down in battle, Zylaa noticed. So the weasels easily bounded up to the first clumps of the scattered demons.

Two demons went down before the demon pack even noticed what was happening.

Zylaa, as a far bigger target, momentarily hung back from the battle. She turned back to her shipmates.

"The 'Fleeters look impressive, but they have no melee weapons," she called over the battle noise. "We need to get out there! Kat, can you shield us?"

[Huntress]

Hunty turned herself carefully, trying to figure out the full scope of the injury in her back. Long... not particularly deep... ow ow ow, crosses a few crucial muscles, makes bending sideways somewhat difficult, ow, nothing bad per se, but terribly inconvenient. Ow.

But Kat was there already, healing her back before she could even say anything. This wasn't the first time she was infinitely glad to have a healing mage in the crew.

"We need a paramedic. If I expend more power, I'll send myself into a coma. But more importantly, who the heck..." The mage was already scanning the room, as Hunty stretched her back again. It wasn't fully hea- ow, but now it just felt numb.

"Spare your power," she grumbled, although in a rather friendly tone. "It's not that bad. It'll take more than that to take me down... eh, thanks. Bloody Mary?"

"Uhuh?" The meepit had, as it were, got off the bus and was now sidling towards her across the floor, focusing all senses on everything he could. It was hard to tell his expression unless you were really close up, but if anyone had been really close up, they would've seen a somewhat nervous scowl. Wounds don't pop out of thin air, so there had to be someone who'd stabbed the captain, but there were no new smells in the air. And the sharp stench of blood didn't make it any easier to detect.

"Can you detect anything?" Oh yes, he should've seen this question coming. Bloody Mary skidded over the last few yards, pulled one of his nigh-impossible acrobatic moves and somehow landed on Hunty's shoulder again.

"You're smelling all over the place and it's impossible to hear anyone who's being very very quiet in this general noise, and I can't see invisible people any better than you do," he said sharply. "You might want to rely on magic or technology here."

Hunty looked around with a frown. Kat was already on her last legs and Fraze- "Where'd the technology go?"

"The tin man? Followed the yellow brick road." Bloody Mary sunk lower on her shoulder. "Went to blow things up, I'd assume. We should go too. If you're in the condition."

"I don't think any of us is in the condition," Hunty said dryly. "This is a hi-tech space station, and they're having trouble with the attackers. What do we have? A mage who's likely to run out of juice and faint any time soon now, and a bunch of rugged pirates with pointy things. I like pointy things, pointy things can be pretty effective," she winced again as she stretched her back which was rather painfully proving her point, "but not against a full-scale assault. If we're to be of any help, we need to do something massive, something we'll be able to pull off."

"If this results in a humorous setup of makeshift traps and a can of paint hanging off a rope," Bloody Mary said sternly, "then I'm going home with the next flight."

"Well, do you have any ideas?"

The meepit paused. "The Realms?"

Hunty could feel a change in the air. It's the kind of change that occurs when a small gang of rodents is suddenly listening very intently.

"The... Realms? You can use it?"

"Pick a better modal," Bloody Mary said grimly. "We can use it, in the sense that we're able to, we're just not allowed to use it, cos we're trouble."

Hunty couldn't argue with that, but she was still getting more confused with the thought. "Trouble in the sense that...?"

"Outlaws," he said. "Besides, magic always makes my nose itch. My point being, if we have a bunch of demons in this dimension here and a bunch of meepits who are able to create portals to a dimension there," Bloody Mary was now sitting up, waving his paws around, "then all we need is some tactical thinking and distractions in order to create portals in the right place and with a big amount of luck, it might work to our advantage."

Hunty paused. "But if you're not allowed to do that..."

"In the same sense that you're not allowed to pillage ships," the meepit said, casting a thoughtful glance in Rider's general direction. "Desperate times?" The latter was a question not so much for Hunty, but for another gang of rodents who had quite a lot more say in the matter.

[Goosh]

Crud. Crud crud crud crud crud.

Goosh had been slightly caught up by the wonders of the Spacefleet base, with its shiny alloys and technology, although mainly he was caught up in other people's pockets. He clinked as he walked.

And it would so happen that he had been in a combatant locker room when the alarms had sounded. Having hidden in an empty locker, the Yurble now emerged nervously. Empty. He clinked out of the room, ready to duck and/or run at the first sign of trouble.

No one was about. Everyone must have been gathered in the nearest sanctuary. Goosh didn't see what the big deal was. The base didn't seem to be under attack, although he didn't actually bother checking around or looking out a window.

Best to just get to the mess hall, since the crew was most probably there. Everyone hunkered in the mess hall in times of defence. He'd get there, stash the loot if necessary, and then--

"Ow!"

He looked down at his paw. Resting on it, eagerly sucking his blood, was some kind of spider. Or not. It had ten legs, glowing rubies of eyes, and seemed to be exsanguinating him with a sort of malevolence.

He smacked it and it disappeared in a puff of smoke. Somewhat worrying. Maybe, the Yurble thought, it was some sort of hypergenetic space spider? Or something?

Ah well. Not that important. Scanning a map on the wall, he located the mess hall doors and tugged at them. Locked, with a keypad eagerly requesting some kind of code.

Goosh swore colourfully. If the station was actually under attack, with the crew was the best place to be. He pressed his paws against the door. They tingled like crazy, though the door itself wasn't cold. Strange.

And then, suddenly, he was through the door and in the mess hall. He felt...wispy, almost, and he wasn't totally certain on how he had gotten there. He shrugged it off and rejoined the crew.

[Jina]

A memory flickered through the spider's brain for a moment. It was taller, it had a long horn and it was chewing on grass. Strange, it had never remembered anything like that before.

Still, it had a body to feed, and there was blood nearby. It scuttled over to the hand and dug it's teeth right in, getting a nice big feed.

As Goosh's hand came down on it, it suddenly realised where the memory had come from. Oh, not again, thought the spider, as it was suddeny whisked halfway across the universe into the body of a mutated green llama that was being subjected to tests that involved high quantities of lipstick.

[glow=green,2,300]--------[/glow]

"All units at Garage 98T, repeat all units at Garage 98T, you are ordered to retreat to the lunar surface and use the breach to bottleneck the enemy. Lieutenant Verom, you are to revive fallen soldiers at Garage 98T to form a shield against melee attack, then go down to the battlefield and ensure a safe escape path for Private Schzain, who will be cloaked. Once she comes out, or if she does not come out before you need to break formation, attempt to break back into the Garage and be aware of melee attacks. All other units, also be aware of possible physical combat."

Lieutenant Verom scanned the points that had been breached already to find where this Garage 98T was. Ah yes, there's them now... although not many seem to have followed orders... Only some of the demons at the back had left the area, the rest too caught up in battle to do anything but fight.

He went over to the comms unit and asked for a repeat of the orders to the demons, then performed his duties. Luckily for him there were quite a few dead demons right next to the breach. He animated them, gave them each a spear of dark magic, and then set them guarding against anything but a demon. Then, he teleported down to the field.

The demons seemed to have it right this time. Most of them had retreated and any that hadn't had died from being outnumbered by the Fleeters. The magic shield seemed more effective now, and the animated guards seemed threatening.

Now, to see if Preivate Schzain was going to retreat.

[Kat]

"I'm already shielding," said Kat to both Zylaa and Huntress. "And don't worry - I'm still good for defense. It's just that my healing magic can't do too much - I'm only making sure you don't lose any more blood, and overexerting myself is obviously never a good idea. The shield's invisible and not as strong as when it's purple, but it should hold us for a bit."

[Omni]

"Garage 98T is about to be breached, and they need me there. The medics should be here soon, make sure they get to that man over there. Good luck!"

Ethan made his way over to the injured man, keeping him company while still keeping an eye on the crowds. "Stay calm, sir. You will be alright."

"The 'Fleeters look impressive, but they have no melee weapons."

…What?! Ethan turned to the weasel girl, still trying to keep his cool. "Hey, I'll let you know that in order to even get into the combat class, you need to have some form of close-range weapon, even if it's just your fists. Most of the 'Fleeters in battle will be combat class. They have melee weapons, just give them a moment to use them."

----------

After awhile, Fesserfa did manage to untie Brian. "There. We should get to the lab, make sure nothing happens."

The two ran down the corridor.

((Gah! It's late…))

[Amneiger]

Amneiger had been sitting in his office in the research sector, checking and rechecking the security systems. He'd almost reached an escape pod when the announcement about the life support system and the order to fortify themselves had been made. So Amneiger had gone back to the research center, locked himself in, and was now watching the cameras for -

"Fesserfa? Brian? This is Professor Amneiger; I'm inside the research center. I've locked the doors, so if you need to come in you'll have to use the keypad."