The medic feverishly dragged O'Toole's limp body away from the open doors and into cover, where he immediately began work on her shoulder wound.  The smashed bullet stuck to her forehead hadn't broken the skin, and was lodged into the clear gel coating at an oblique angle.  O'Toole was lucky - the full head-on force of that bullet would have created a shock in her skull that would have reduced her brains to jelly.  As it was, she probably had a concussion.  He felt her skull for fractures.  Nothing apparent, but she was not going to be in fighting shape for a while.<br/><br/>"GET DOWN!" Halvorson screamed, responding to Feign's signal.  Everyone in the room dove into cover.  Bright white light flooded the hall and parts of the chapel for an instant, and surprised yells from the hall were immediately drowned out by the "pop," as Feign termed it, which filled the room with harshly ringing noise.<br/><br/>Before the noise had fully subsided, Halvorson had thrown himself through the doorway and onto his side in the hall, firing mercilessly at the disoriented guards.  From where they stood, gathered atop a short, wide staircase that led to a higher level of the Palace underground, the guards fell in heaps, some tumbling down the steps.  The smoldering flashbang arrow was lodged in the throat of a dead guard.<br/><br/>Halvorson let out the breath his lungs were molesting, then got to his feet and made sure to cover the hallway.  He looked behind him - the hall ended in a small alcove not too far back.  Ahead, past the staircase, it continued for many yards until it hit a wall and branched off sideways.  The wall across from the chapel doors contained a single narrow door, barred shut from his side.  The dim light coming through the bars on the door's small inset window didn't tell him much, but he guessed the dungeon was through there.<br/><br/>"Baz, Mad, with me!  Sara, Feign, Doc, hold this place!"  He looked at Mad.  "Get us to Karogen's cell, quick!"<br/><br/>More guards instantly rounded the bend of the hallway up past the steps.  Halvorson dropped to his knee and opened fire, trying to minimize his profile using the angle of the stairs.  The guards ducked and ran back around the bend at the noise.  Some tried to return fire, but they had difficulty seeing Halvorson below the top step.  "GO!" he called, keeping his gun trained on the guards as he motioned Baz and Mad toward the dungeon's doorway.<br/><br/>-----<br/><br/>Arget found himself in a small, cramped compartment.  To his chagrin, it was still quite hot, and due to the lower degree of airflow here, it was much more stifling.  Luckily for Arget, though, he could definitely tell where he was.<br/><br/>A plethora of different ducts fed into this compartment, undoubtedly leading from various parts of the floor.  This was the central exhaust unit for this floor.  The fan he'd disabled helped to draw air into the exaust ducts of the building from the exhaust ducts for the floor.  Even more lucky for him, he could see and feel a panel beneath him, mounted with screws.  Dead silence reigned, save from some ducts through which he could even hear the sound from various rooms filtering in: alarms, muted shouts...<br/><br/>-----<br/><br/>The lieutenant talking with Heretic replied, "What's happened is our Colonel's gone missing.  And she's more than sad, buddy, she's--"<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">Ilns maw begins really glowing and sparking as she looks to the building she feels Merelli in. She was losing him! She tried to move away, anything to get closer, then opened her maw, the ball of lightning speeding away from her only to impact the buildings wall. <br/>"There! Go, Raice! Go! Merelli is losing his life!"</span><br/><br/>The First Sergeant flinched as Iln released the bolt of energy.  He looked at Raice, wondering all at once who he was, but at the same time wondering what put him in charge.  He began moving without being told to, towards the building.  "Come on!"  he called behind him, more at Jenten and Marice than at anyone else.<br/><br/>-----<br/><br/>Merelli felt very cold suddenly, as if ice had been dropped onto his whole body.  Then he realized that it was the needle lodged just below the device on his neck, piercing through the pressure point in the hollow of his collarbone.  He saw Iln in his mind's eye, doing his best to focus on the image of his beloved companion.  Twenty years apart was going to end rather sadly for her.  He hoped she did not have time to grieve for him.<br/><br/>A needle found a mark in his genitals.  His sight vanished in a blaze of new pain.<br/><br/>-----<br/><br/>Maeve did her best not to complain as Dreamer took her over his youthful shoulder, but she couldn't help the acidic pain in her throat as she grew sick over the mention of Lakran.  Last she had seen of her husband, he was firing his shotgun through a window as humans massed outside.  She had run upstairs to... why had she gone upstairs?  What made her do that?  Why did she retreat from his side when he needed her the most?<br/><br/>She gulped down the acid and the tears.  It hadn't been too long after she'd ascended when a horrific crash told her all she'd ever needed to know: the rebels were in the house, and she was doomed.  And Lakran...<br/><br/>The descent from the top floor to the ground floor of the mansion was brief.  Immediate silence filled the whole living space as Dreamer and Kitten emerged into it from the stairway.  People stood in groups, suddenly distracted from their animated discussions by the entry of their fellow former slave and his unknown companion.  They saw their former mistress slung over Dreamer's shoulder like a prize being stolen.<br/><br/>Geena was there, eyeing Dreamer from far across the room as she stood in the open front doorway.  Overturned furniture and torn upholstery made the scene as uninviting as it possibly could be.  Sunlight illuminated dust particles near the windows.  Silence.<br/><br/>A man with a meat cleaver in his hand spoke.  "What the fuck is going on?  You killed Lanner, and now you're just leaving with the cow?"<br/><br/>Uneasy murmurings passed through the room.<br/><br/>-----<br/><br/>Alhanda caught Chiro's distinct reptilian odor on the air.  She could smell him lingering just beyond the door.  Suddenly he was there, wielding the clumsy riot shield he'd brought with him.  Her knives arced out in half-circles, slashing at his elbows and shins as she slid herself through the doorway and behind him, slashing again at his wings.  She saw what he had in his other hand...<br/><br/>Suddenly, the purpose for Chiro's attack was clear.  He was a distraction, given his opportunity for revenge against her while the real effort - the escape of Mark Karogen - was going on below.  Eric Lentan was trying to kill two birds with one stone.<br/><br/>But Chiro was alone with her.  He had no allies to help him.  As he reacted to her attacks, she took the chance to leap onto the lower flight of stairs and call out, "I see now, half-breed!  You're the slave of slaves!  Killing me won't change that!"  She stood, waiting for his attack, her muscles tensed for evasion.  "What good is that weapon to you, when it was built to slay your own kind?  Take it back to your human masters, and give them dominion over you!"