At the shout of Grubs, James had forgotten about his pain in an instant.  It was funny how one only just needed to hear a name before the body reacted as it did with James.  There was a brief jolt of fear that jolted  in his chest, the one and only sign of fear that James allowed himself to feel before the adrenaline came rushing through his body in response.<br/><br/>"Now we're talking!" James couldn't help but shout aloud, his eyes wide and alert, a grin coming to his face.  Lifting his Lancer form his lap, James unstrapped himself from his seat and stood up just in time for John to open the doors to one side of the Raven, taking the machine gun.  After hooking a safety line between his armor and one of the overhead safety rails so that he wouldn't fall from the Raven, James stood next to his comrade to peer outside.<br/><br/>He saw the Nemacysts a second after Damion announced the presence of Seeders.  They slowly rose into the air, organic blobs with black ink trailing behind them, red eyes glowing along their bodies.  Yeah, they were slow at first but upon spotting the King Raven the Nemacysts suddenly shot towards them.  Sighting down his Lancer, James fired upon the incoming Nemacysts, making sure to fire in slow, controlled bursts.  The older model of his weapon had a lot more stopping power then the modern version, but that power came at a price of a smaller magazine size and a larger kick so he couldn't be spraying with it as much as he would like to.<br/><br/>The adrenaline was working his body overtime, causing his muscles and nervous system to work faster.  As James managed to shoot down one of the Nemacysts, making it explode in a shower of fire and ink, the elation of the kill and the adrenaline rush had put a permanent grin on his face as he swung to fire on the next incoming Nemacyst.<br/><br/>"Come and get it, come and get it!" James whispered fiercely as the Lancer kicked against his shoulder. "Come on, keep coming!  I'm just gonna keep blasting you bastards apart!"<br/><br/>At first it seemed like they were doing just that.  His Lancer fire combined with John's mounted machine gun was cutting through the Nemacysts that approached them.  At first.  But then one got too close.  By the time he noticed the closing Nemacyst, James had pointed his Lancer just as John hit it with again.  The force of the detonating Nemacyst caused the Raven to shake and made James stumble back.  Black ink filled his vision but just before it could overwhelm him, a figure came up between him and the poisonous vapors.  Before James's eyes the figure convulsed and spasmed, unable to scream before it dropped.<br/><br/>"John is hit!" James reported right as Darion ordered for the medic and that someone get on the gun.  James dragged John away from the door of the Raven so that he didn't fall and so that Jess could have a look at him.  That wasted a couple precious seconds of no one firing out this side of the chopper and once he had dragged his comrade far enough away from the door, James immediately went to the abandoned gun, intent on taking it and using it himself.  And then something hit them.  What had to be another Nemacyst, the Raven suddenly bucked and James suddenly found himself flying.<br/><br/>For a very brief second, James found his feet stepping through the open door of the Raven and he was looking down at hundreds of feet of air that separated him from the rapidly approaching ground.  Then the safety line grew taut and tugged him back into the chopper, saving him from falling to his death.<br/><br/>As much as he would've loved to keep firing, the falling chopper had him struggling to keep on his feet.  The safety line was his only measure of security and though it kept him inside the chopper, it had enough slack that it wouldn't stop him from stumbling and falling on the deck.  Keeping one hand on his Lancer, James braced himself as the chopper spun, fell...<br/><br/>Then everything was silent and black just as James saw the roof of a building and heard the loud, violent crash of the Raven hitting it.<br/><br/>He wasn't out for long, had to be at least for a minute before James opened his eyes again.  A wave of dizziness and a pounding at his head caused the Gear to groan painfully and an arm raised so that he could nurse his head.  A sharp pain at said arm told him not to use it.  That was when he noticed a few other things: that he was being held up in the air and that he was slowly swinging back and forth.  He saw the safety line still attached to his armor but it took a few, slow seconds for James to understand what he was seeing.  The Raven had apparently crashed at an angle and the safety line had saved him from making a violent and no doubt painful tumble down to the cockpit.  The result, however, was that the line was currently holding him up in mid air.<br/><br/>James looked this way and that, trying to look for damage and survivors.  He couldn't see their squad leader, nor any get a good look at the others, but the newly-made holes in the chopper's armor told him that they weren't in the air anymore but rather on the ground...in a building?  James stretched out his limbs, trying to find any damage.  There was plenty but it was minor.  He was battered and probably had quite a few bruises but there was this stabbing pain at the back of his head that told him that he had banged it against something and what probably caused him to black out.  It made him dizzy as well, making it difficult to gather his thoughts.  There was another pain, the one from before at his arm that he had noticed when he awoken, and James looked to see what was wrong.<br/><br/>"Oh, that's a lot of blood," the scout murmured to himself.<br/><br/>There was a large cut at the left side of his arm, starting at his shoulder and trailing about halfway down to his bicep.  Blood leaked out of the injury and coated his arm in red and James was starting to wonder if his dizziness wasn't just from the hit to the head but a growing amount of blood loss.  In a brief moment of clarity, James noticed that the cut was too clean to have been cut by a piece of ravaged metal of the Raven's hulk.  His Lancer was missing and James wondered if he had managed to cut himself with the bayonet of his own weapon during the crash by accident.  His right arm was fine, however, and James used it to check the back of his head.  There was that bump, possibly the same one from before during their pilot's crazy stunt, but there was a slickness to it that made him wonder if skin had been broken and he was bleeding there too.<br/><br/>"Shit..."<br/><br/>First things first; he couldn't exactly help himself or anyone else by just hanging around here.  Unfortunately, when he tried to unlock the cable from his armor, he found the locking mechanism jammed.  Double shit.  His hand immediately went to his chest and, unsheathing the knife there, he started to cut at the line.  Because of his dizzy thoughts, he wasn't exactly thinking about what this action could result in and when he remembered that he was still hanging in the air and that the line was the only thing keeping him up-<br/><br/>"<span style="color: RoyalBlue">C'mon. Wake up everybody. We gotta keep movin'</span>"<br/><br/>Huh?<br/><br/><i>Snap!</i><br/><br/>"Woah!"<br/><br/><i>Thud!</i><br/><br/>James at least remembered to keep his knife close and his head tucked into his chest so that he wouldn't bang it into something else as he fell through the bay of the Raven.  The<i>thud</i>was him smashing into the other end of the Raven, near the cockpit, and James couldn't help it; he let out a loud, pained "Fuck!" as his arm took on a whole new level of pain, not having liked the fall one bit.  Groaning, James shakily resheathed his knife and tried to look for the others.  He had heard Andrea just before he had fallen so at least she was alive.<br/><br/>"Oh, there you are," James spoke, his words sounding tired and delirious when he saw his Lancer nearby, apparently having dropped at the same spot.  Thank God he didn't land on it.  However, he saw the blood that stained the blade of the bayonet and he knew that his earlier assumption that he had managed to cut his arm with it seemed to be proven right.  Reaching over, the Gear snagged the weapon and looked into the cockpit to check on both their pilot and Andrea as he had heard her voice coming from outside, near the cockpit.<br/><br/>There was the sound of banging coming from the cockpit when James decided roll along the deck so that he could stick his head into the cockpit and see if Jeanette was fine.  Seeing her slumped in her seat, blood everywhere, and a console smashed into her chest told him that she wasn't.  That helped wake James up from his stupor and the Gear quickly stood up and went to check on her.  He saw Andrea outside of the cockpit, banging on the metal to try and wake up Jeanette if James had to guess and he gave her a shaky thumbs up and a low "I'm here, I'm here" to tell her that he was alive and that he would check on Jeanette.  Placing his Lancer on his back, James knelt down next to their pilot, peering at her face to see if she was alive.<br/><br/>Using his right arm - what with his left arm covered in his own blood -, James gently slapped the side of her face, trying to wake her.  With the blood at her face and how her head was tilted back, eyes closed, James hoped that she was just unconscious and not dead.  Despite his complaints about her on the ride over, he certainly didn't want to see her dead!  He gently pushed against the console that was at her chest.  It was heavy but he could get it off her if he tried.  But was she alive?<br/><br/>"Medic!" James belatedly called as he waited a response from either Jess or Jeanette.<div class="messageTextEndMarker"> </div>