This is continued from a previous post - same time-box as before. I'm hoping to finish it up tonight. For a breath, there was nothing but silence. Then, in the flickering of the emergency lights, Dana saw first one, then two shapes roll, groaning painfully. Forgetting her leg for the moment, she hobbled as quickly as she could into the back and threw herself against the wall, leaning down as best she could to check on the team. Right below here lay Timo. He was down, clearly down; some of the shrapnel had caught him. She suppressed a shudder at the half-glimpsed glint of metal protruding from his skull, so blatantly out of place among the shaman's otherwise-wholly-natural gear. Movement caught the corner of Dana's eye, and she tore her gaze from poor Timo's battered body. The other three members of her team were cautiously extracting themselves from their harnesses, visibly favoring injured arms and legs. Pauley had obviously snapped her forearm, but thankfully her left; she could still carry her sidearm. Jenssen, half-titanium that he was, looked fine if just a little dazed. He was the first free and was helping Case, clutching at her right side, to her feet. We're up, those of us who can be. But how long were we down? How long to we have? Quickly, Dana swiped at her left ear, remembering her comms dangling precariously there. She re-seated the link in her ear and quickly tapped her AR feed for Fly and Soary. Fly was just returning static - he must be alive but disabled. Soary, however, was still active and had auto-triggered his "guard-dog" expert routines. He was keeping the infantry busy for the moment, but Dana could see the harsh, pulsing red of his stores counter; he was dry on rockets and down to 37 rounds of 5.56. "All right, everybody up, and out! We've got 90 seconds to clear this bird and get ourselves lost. Grab what gear you can and move!" Dana threw herself across the bay to the rear door override. "Rifles, sidearms, and frags first. We've got mechanized infantry incoming, and they'll punch through Lydia long before evac gets here. Best chance is that valley a klick or so east of here, so we've gotta move. Jenssen, stims for everybody, now." As the team half-hustled, half-crawled into the jungle, Dana called up Lydia's AR menu one last time. Last step... goodbye, Lydia. We'll miss you, girl, she thought to herself as she primed the three anti-armor missiles still hanging from Lydia's pylons. Say hello to those jackasses, Lyd. With that, Dana pulled herself into the undergrowth, dragging herself after Jenssen to the rattle of distant but approaching gunfire. |
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