Halvorson nodded at Feign.  "My definition of 'reason' is gonna be pretty damn broad when that time comes, fella."<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">"Keep yer haeds down! Fire in the hole!"</span><br/><br/>Immediately spotting the multitude of explosives Baz was handling, Halvorson snagged O'Toole by the wrist, taking her back into the corridor as Feign also ran for cover.  Three earsplitting explosions later and all three doors were in varying states of destruction: splintered, burning, or utterly incinerated.<br/><br/>As the middle door had taken the Molotov and was only in flames, Halvorson and O'Toole immediately rushed to the destroyed doors on either side, the medic coming into the chapel and covering their advance.  O'Toole had to avoid some residual specks of white phosphorus, but this was nothing to her as she jammed lead into the guards that still breathed on the other side of the door.  Halvorson similarly dispatched a few, and for the moment the coast was clear.<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">"Anythin else ya want chief? I'm pretty sure I got an M67 and a flashbang or two 'ere somewhere!" He cackles again "And for the heavy stuff- ones tha'll go through doors an' walls... show me where and it'll take me aboot five minutes to set one up. But I only got three of the buggers so be careful!" <br/><br/>He ruffles through his backpack. "Oooh, helloo there..." He grins. "Anyone want me to set up a shredder mine or two? Or maybe a spring mine? I forgot I had these buggers"</span><br/><br/>Halvorson smiled, cocking an eye over his shoulder at Baz.  "Hang onto those, we might need 'em later."  He looked at Mad.  "Coast is clear for a sec.  Mind leading us to the dungeon?"<br/><br/>Gunfire broke out from down the hallway to Halvorson's right, beyond where O'Toole was standing in her doorway.  Chips of stone flew from the doorjamb beside Halvorson and he reeled back, pressing himself against the wall to the side of the door, trying to see who was shooting.<br/><br/>O'Toole was staggering away from her doorway, clutching her forehead and shoulder.  Her gun hung from its strap.  Blood oozed from between the fingers of the hand on her shoulder.  She seemed dazed, moving slowly, her eyes wide in shock.  The hand on her forehead fell away, revealing a smashed bullet embedded in the clear coating of liquid armor she'd rubbed there.<br/><br/>"SHIT!  DOC!" Halvorson shouted.  The medic rushed to O'Toole, pulling her away from the door just as she collapsed to her knees.  A guard - this one carrying an assault rifle - came into view beyond the doorframe.  Halvorson tried to fire from his vantage point but was pinned back by more gunfire from an unseen source.  "BAZ!  SARA!  COVER ME!"  The guard near the doorway fell to his belly and fired into the chapel in a wide arc...<br/><br/>-----<br/><br/>Arget could easily feel the heat blowing at him from the direction of the darkness, to his left down the shaft.  His keen eyes could see the shaft extend a couple dozen feet or so, punctuated by vertical stacks occasionally, before disappearing into a pitch-dark opening.  A mechanical hum reached him from the darkness.  To his right, the shaft branched off into a few horizontal shafts and more vertical stacks before rounding a corner far down the way.  The light he had seen earlier was coming up from one of the stacks too small for him to fit through.<br/><br/>-----<br/><br/>The Resistance men standing before Bachera and Heretic looked at each other, knocked very well off their mental tracks by being addressed by a pint-sized vulpine atop a hypnotized, oversized lupine.  The lieutenant got the point of what Heretic was saying, though.<br/><br/>"I think you ought to try something else," he said to Heretic.  "That scalie girl over there can..." he turned to gesture at Iln, and stopped when he saw her.<br/><br/>Iln was frantic, sparking and shouting at Raice, writhing atop her massive stomach.<span style="font-style: italic">"Merelli is dieing! Raice, I can't move! Go! Take Soldiers with you and light!"</span><br/><br/>First Sergeant Millhouse stopped chatting idly with a surviving member of his platoon, snapping into action.  "Jenten, Marice!  Come on!"  He ran in Raice's direction.  Several dozen soldiers followed along without even being ordered.<br/><br/>Janus and Fenson lay sleeping in the grass, removed from the commotion by the medics.  On Fenson's neck, a single silver scale shone in the md-morning light.<br/><br/>-----<br/><br/>The smell of blood invigorated Merelli's nostrils, though his throat gagged on the texture of it.  He'd never before known true agony like this, and as a result he tried his best to concentrate on something... anything... just to remove his mind from it, to dull his senses and release his soul from its hot iron grip.  Relief came as a new needle slid in between his ribs, and he knew that didn't feel quite so bad as the ones on his face...<br/><br/>-----<br/><br/>Maeve Blotar worked with dignity to clothe herself through her scars and aches.  As Dreamer taught Kitten the many functions of guns, she took him in from a corner of her eye.  Scarcely had she let him go and he was back again, coming to the rescue as always, using up one of his numerous lives to save hers.  She smirked.  Some men, she had once jokingly told him, would do anything for sex.<br/><br/>A murmur began to build in the house below them.  Nothing loud or threatening, just a soft murmur of a lot of people talking all at once.  The instant feeling that something had gone strangely wrong flowed into the bedroom.  Maeve zipped up the bodysuit, quickly pulling an innocuous blouse and pantsuit over it.  She eyed Dreamer.  "Time is running out," she said simply.<br/><br/>-----<br/><br/>Alhanda growled and kicked off Chiro's arm, pulling her makhaira free from his grip.  She felt the heat of the blazing wall and knew what the anthro-dragon had said was true.  She also saw the cracks in her blade and knew it was instantly rendered too unreliable for this fight.  She spun in a tight spiral, loosing the makhaira in Chiro's direction as she darted for the corridor and lunged into a stairwell, pulling two knives from sheaths within her armor.  The heat had been avoided, but the dragon was not far behind, and she used her advantage in being hidden by the stairway door to drop two floors while unseen, jumping from flight to flight of stairs until she reached the door of her choice, thrusting it open and letting it stay that way.<br/><br/>He probably knew she would be waiting in ambush on the other side of the door.  She didn't care so much, as long as she had the 50/50 chance of being on the side of the door he didn't check first.  Her knives waited, striking forward the moment Chiro appeared.