<strong><span class="bbc_u">Sean Gallegar and Alec Llewellyn</span></strong><br/><br/>The strength of the two men, combined with the slanted floor and the rifle's tremendous recoil, were more than enough to pull the guard off her feet and through the hatch.  The odd angle caused them to lose their balance, and the three figures tumbled to the airlock's deck in a pile of limbs and thermal suits.  Sean, aside from his broken jaw, fared rather well.  Alec, who received the brunt of the guard's weight via her ceramic ballistic vest, less so.  Stars swam in his blurred vision against the gunmetal grey ceiling, and a sharp pain radiated from his solar plexus as his breath was knocked out of him.  Fortunately, the only significant injury was some bruising on the chest, and he would probably recover quickly from the blow.<br/><br/>The guard was screaming furiously, thrashing against their grips.  "No you motherfuckers, you don't get it!  They're going to fall!"  She was surprisingly strong despite her petite frame, and may even give Sean and Alec a few good whacks with her fists and elbows if they weren't quick enough.  Her rifle had been thrown from her grasp.<br/><br/><hr/><br/><strong><span class="bbc_u">Zoey Calhoun and Rebekah Graham</span></strong><br/><br/>The guard's rifle bounced along the floor, an oblong rectangle of grey metal smoking at one end, and came to rest at Rebekah's feet.<br/><br/>Beside her, Zoey pulled the lever labeled "<strong>Manual Override: Disengage Payload</strong>".<br/><br/><hr/><br/>In the corridor beyond the hatch, you watch as the swarm's turbine swivels like a glass eye in a socket too large for it.  Bullets continued to ping off it, courtesy if the surviving soldiers.  They fired at a greater rate now that you and the others had evacuated the area.  The swarm writhed and vibrated, as if torn between advancing on the easy prey or going after the soldiers.  It's cables thrashed, some spinning aimlessly in a futile attempt to deflect bullets, the others repeatedly punching holes in the disintegrating plastic walls.<br/><br/>With a sputtering, choking sound, the swarm's turbine went dark.<br/><br/>The writhing became more violent, and the swarm abruptly split into two as if it had been ripped in half by giant, invisible hands.  The two new "swarmlings", initially amorphous, rapidly took on a form similar to what their "parent" had assumed, minus the turbine.  Cables, smaller but no less deadly, sunk hooks in the walls.  One advanced towards the distant soldiers, the other came for you.<br/><br/>Zoey pulled the lever.<br/><br/>Beyond the hatch, the corridor and it's contents suddenly seemed to shrink away on hidden greased rails.  There came a series of dull thuds, and the grinding whir of heavy machinery.  A cable snapped taut with an audible<em>twang</em>.  The corridor dropped half a meter, then caught.  What had just been the hatchway was now a white doorway opened in the midst of a yawning chasm.  It hung swaying, surrounded by open air, a cube of white amidst an endless expanse of inky black nothingness.<br/><br/>The swarmlings froze.  The soldiers ceased their fire.  The steady wind, which had up to that point been a constant chill flow through the corridor, now became a hurricane.  Above Alec, the guard let out a keening wail that sliced through the storm.<br/><br/>There came another heavy<em>clunk</em>as massive gears turned over one another.  With a final metallic snap, the doorway and the corridor beyond it dropped silently into that empty, endless abyss.<br/><br/>For a brief moment, it seemed as if the ferocious gale would tear you from the airlock and throw you out of the plane to fall helplessly to the frozen wastes below.  Then the guard reached out and kicked the steel hatchway shut with a deafening<em>clang</em>.<br/><br/>The wind immediately ceased.<br/><br/>Beneath you, the plane lurched at the sudden loss in weight, but the pilots quickly regained control.  For the first time in two minutes, the plane began to ease out of its jaunty tilt.  A few more seconds and it would be level once more.<br/><br/>The guard lunged for her rifle.