[center][h2][b]Ilshar Ard’sabekh[/b][/h2][/center]


The hatch had yielded easily - entirely too easily. The odds that all those systems would have been working so well after the rest of the station had been in that state for so long were slim. Someone had probably been keeping this entrance functional, and it would have been strange if that was all they had been doing. Ilshar nodded at Rho-Hux's words, not paying the part about one Xis-Nev too much mind - concentrations of ether could have this effect on people sometimes - and followed, ready to fire. 

Fortunately, there were no traps or improvised alarms behind the opening, nor a guard. The latter was not too surprising, considering the creeping intrusions from the Chasm that spilled through the corridor ahead. It was not healthy to remain among them for too long, as Ilshar was reminded when the squad advanced deeper into the infested structure. Presently, it was lucky that many of his senses were curtailed by his vacuum equipment; the ambient qillatu was unpleasant enough on his purely etheric organs without having to feel it on his skin. 

More obvious and more troubling was the sensation of a viscous sheen gathering and drifting in heavy, though immaterial trails. Its fluid appearance was what alarmed him most: it might just have been an approximation of that force that he could visualise, but one thing was often as true in the Chasm as in the material - vibrations in a fluid carried both ways. If the Envenomed were not wary enough in sounding this presence, whatever lay further along it might sense them before they did it. 

[b]"Careful with skimming the Chasm here. Some things could have an easier time finding us by the ripples,"[/b] Ilshar whispered aloud, as much to Salvator as to anyone who might be about to follow him in probing the ambient trail. Suppressing the distraction of the ominously regular sounds from not quite so far, he cast his senses into the ether, compacting his projection as a lightly drifting spore rather than a denser tendril. With an effort of will, he cast it onto the upwards-leading trail. His body continued to move forward in steady steps, but almost insensibly. He would have to rely on the others if something unexpected struck at this moment.