[color=goldenrod][i][h2][center]Gerard Segremors[/center][/h2][/i][/color]

For a moment, something flashed on Segremors's steel-cast countenance to confirm the suspicions of all present, as the demoness appeared not at the fore he and Fleuri presented, but instead atop the Captain, Renar, and Rolan. It tasted of acrid, sour disgruntlement, the ash of a promptly torched understanding of the proceedings. He'd been gathering courage for this, had willingly volunteered to shoulder it and prove his growth to not only them, but to [i]himself[/i]—

And then the bombardment came, and he bit it down as he dove behind the cover of the next boulder. Spheres of arcane force bloosomed out from the points of impact like ripples on placid water, the unfurling petals of so many sunflowers close to home— and what was more, those that didn't whizz past drove thunderclaps through the back of his surcoat, as they hammered into the upturned stone. The two Reonites had very different levels of schooling to compare between them, but both could intuit clear as day— hunkering down here and waiting out wasn't in the cards.

Still dealing with overwhelming force. There was a tempo to follow, he could feel it hitting his back through the soon-to-be-rubble. As the orbs rolled on into his field of view, they shrank in tune with the distance... and maintained their course, and their angle.

It dawned on him swiftly.

[color=goldenrod]"There's a pattern here..."[/color] he muttered, chancing a peek over the top of the boulder, to the points of impact. Every flower draws back into a stem, every reaching branch of a tree back to a trunk. He ducked back down, and made eye contact with the man at his side, sparing a mere moment to glance down to the bottom, where their supposed prey had turned up. His words tumbled out, half to his partner, half to himself, all with purpose.

[color=goldenrod]"Cover's not gonna last. This is the shot we're getting! Renar's with the Captain, they can handle her—"[/color]

Just like staring down the earth-cracking strikes of the Hammer, stillness meant death. Use your head. Read the situation. Find the throughline in front of you. Adapt to the holes you get and pry them open. Small margins get bigger. A single moment seized turns certain loss into an opportunity to win. Even the mortally wounded can crush the throat of the Shadow, provided he has a clear vision of what he must do.

A deep, bassy split behind, and a shift in the earth as weight fell. 

Time to go.

[color=goldenrod]"On me! We move as one and we'll make it through!"[/color]