[IC] Final Fantasy VIII: Tempus Veneficarum [7/10 Slots]

[Little_ninja]

Looking over 'Royce' and 'Mako', who both seemed to have just keeled over after failing to comprehend the situation, Xerox could hear Heliose's footsteps approaching as well as another person's. With his keen sense of hearing from practicing echolocation, Xerox knew the voice of those footsteps. It was Jake Firesong, a member who was part of the capture of Biggs, back in Timber. Overwatch? Who is he talking to? Xerox wondered, suspicions arising. Heliose commented on the nudity in front of them, joking about the situation. After Heliose had arrived, joking about the situation, Jake had arrived, seeming to remember Xerox. "Hey. Looks like your still alive, ey Jake?" he casually replied, showing that he remembered Jake. "Yeah, this is Heliose, top notch with a knife/dagger, and this is Rachel, best support you could get." he quickly introduced. "Girls, this is Jake. Only worked with him for a bit, but definitely was capable." The two, from memory, didn't really fight side-by-side or anything, they were on different parts of the mission, so there wasn't much to go on.

Rachel, fortunately, gladly explained the current situation. "Well ... I was trying to just keep them inside the cell and transport the cell with us, by putting it into my ESS, however, I only pulled out all the inorganic stuff." he quickly interrupted Rachel to fully explain, before letting her continue.

Being ordered around, Xerox pulled out from his ESS a lot of medical equipment, before bringing out a trolley with straps and carrying 'Mako' onto it and tying him down. 'Mako' was hogtied and then strapped onto the trolley. "Just put that guy on here too, when you're done. Anyway, we better make our way up, to Duncan and the others soon." Xerox said, before stepping in front of the others, bringing out a giant hammer, and making a giant swing, slamming a number of soldiers that were coming around the corner.

[Lennon79]

'F-fuck you...' It was all Royce could do to keep from passing out. With his pacemaker and even his backup dead, he only had a few seconds to leave a witty repartee. Despite the lightness in his head, he could see what the SeeD girl wanted to do. Every fibre of his being told him to fight, to stand up and give her what for, but blood loss and lack of oxygen rendered him impotent. With the last of his energy, he drew a knife from his belt, drew his arm back to throw... and darkness took him. Royce was unconscious before the blade even the the deck.

---

'One!' The grenade detonated a split second before SeeD stormed the control room. With Jericho and the others on their side, the fight was decidedly one sided. Duncan charged up and headed left, moving down a pair of shocked technicians at their work stations before swinging round to pour fire on a charging mech. Between them, they took down the soldiers within the minute. Once the smoke had settled, he slung the machine gun over one soldier and turned to the others. 'Alright then, let's get to work. Spread out, turn off any vital systems you can find; power, ventilation, Hell kill the lights if you can.' He had faith that the anti-0magic field was down and that the others had succeeded in their goal. Now it was time to find out who their mystery saviours were... He trotted out to an open hatch, leading outside of the facility. Dry, listless wind blew in, giving him a good idea of where they were. The light blinded him as he ducked outside, but as his vision cleared, the sight before Duncan's eyes left him in awe. A great sea of sand stretched away to the horizon, with dunes a mile high and dust devils racing to and fro. Now that, he had expected; anyone who was anyone in Galbadia knew about the President's little prison for political dissidents. What shocked him was that he was looking down on this grand vista from at least a hundred foot up. 'What the..?' He was speechless, awed by the pure scale of the design. It was something uniquely Galbadian in a way; form over function, audaciousness over practicality.

Regardless, they needed a way down and sharpish. With the anti-magic field offline, they could just dive off and use magic to land safely, but they couldn't leave til everyone was present. And some nagging thing in the back of his mind told him that if he didn't find their mysterious intruder, he would suffer for it later... '... Xerox, you guy's gotta hurry. In five minutes, we're leaving. I want all SeeDs up here and ready by then.' He strode back into the control room, looking for a CCTV station. 'You guys, take a look outside. Think of a good way to get yourselves down in one piece and be ready to jump in five.' Meanwhile, he busied himself by flicking through the camera channels, hoping to find some evidence of who was attacking the prison. Here and there he saw flashes of soldiers running about, most in Galbadian reds and blues, but also in a uniform he didn't expect; Galbadia Garden. Had Garden sent in Galbadian SeeDs to extract them? It would make sense, but that didn't explain the prickling feeling on the back of his neck... While browsing the channels, he stumbled upon another feed that caught his eye. A man was trussed up to a medieval-looking device, his dark hair matted and torn. Duncan paused for a long moment, his eyes narrowing. The prisoner chose that moment to raise his head painfully and Duncan instantly recognised his as a member of his team. 'Found Kein! He's on this level.' Several seconds of furious typing later, he found a schematic. 'I'll get him. Jericho, hold the fort and keep breaking shit. I'll only be a minute.'

Out of the control room, down a side corridor and two dead soldiers later, Duncan found the cell. Rigging up a couple of grenades into a makeshift breaching charge, he stood back and detonated it. This time he took his entrance slowly, swinging left and right before deeming it clear. Before he could call out, Kein spoke in a cracked voice. 'Ins... tructor... T-the girl... She's one of... them...' It took a while to cut him down, but Duncan was able to haul him out eventually. 'Save your breath kid, you've done well. Hold on and we'll get you patched up.' He took the time to cast a battery of healing spells on Kein, but barely managed to stabilise the poor lad. He would need a good period of convalescence once they got home. With Kein slung fireman-style over one shoulder and the machine gun handing ready from a sling on the other, Duncan made his way back to the control room just in time to meet Xerox's group heading up from the stairwell.

'Better late than never, kid.' To his surprise, they were accompanied by another familiar face. 'As I live and breath, Mr Firesong. Good to see you; I take it Galbadia Garden ain't too much a fan of the new government?' Well that explained most of the explosions his team weren't responsible for. 'Did you uh, bring Syrus along or something..?'

[rivaan]

“That’s just plain rude. To say that to the person trying to keep you alive.” Rachel said with cold voice as she heard Royce swear at her. Granted she was preparing to open him up like a turkey, but hey who can blame her right now. Not that anyone in their sane mind would stop her right now, with her with blood till her elbows, a scalpel plus a freshly extracted from still alive person heart.

She threw a quick glance as she watched the man draw a knife. In her eye could be read what would almost amount for entertainment from his attempt before he passed out again.” Okey, Xerox. I will have him patched in a minute and we can move!” Rachel stated and hastened her actions. Her work was by no way sloppy, but what she was doing right now was not a life saving operation, but rather prolonging. Using healing potion she injected with a syringe directly in the damaged tissue, she quickly changed the man’s heart with a new one. It was not pretty… and well wasn’t going to hold out for long. Hell if she hadn’t put him in healing potion system to be constantly injected into him. He probably wouldn’t survive more than an hour… maybe less.

“Okey, he’s ready for transportation!” She stated as just a minute and a few seconds passed since Xerox’s warning they needed to move. She was covered in blood and looked as if she stepped out from a horror story or something, but she didn’t care.” I will work on him more once we get away, so I can stabilize him more.”

“Xerox, I’m pretty sure this guy had a gun, give it to me.” She said pointing at Royce when they started to move.” You probably stored it away with the room.” She added and gulped down a healing potion herself again.

[MarshiestMallow]

Sometimes Heloise wondered if weird stuff just happened around her, or if it was just coincidence. Perhaps weird stuff happened around everyone. She would perhaps never know the answer to that. Taking the situation in, she let the others deal with what was going on, deciding to do what she did best. Hide and throw daggers. She hissed as the man Xerox introduced as Jake took a image of her, baring her teeth in a snarl. "Its incredibly rude to take a photo of someone, while they are aware of you, without asking. I don't like my photo taken"

Perhaps if they weren't in such a dire situation, Heloise would steal the PDA, just to make her point, but she didn't wish to waste the time or energy to do so. At least right then. She glared at the newcomer, before going back to her surveillance, listening to the others talking. As Xerox stepped into deal with the group of Soldiers, Heloise took what ones she could out, retrieving her daggers, not wish to leave any behind, and she followed as they made their move to join the others, occasionally darting ahead to scout and make sure there were no more soldiers.

She otherwise stayed close to the others, keeping two daggers in her hands, feeling oddly content. She had weapons in her hands, and a job to do. That was all she needed out of life, but how annoying was it to feel the need, more and more, to be around people, since meeting Hector? She sighed, pulling her thoughts back to the here and now, rather then on her own...was it an identity crisis? she didn't know, so she pushed it all away, and glanced about them once more.

[akirashadow]

Jake nodded a greeting as Xerox introduced him to the two ladies who he had not met before then. Heloise and Rachel... they seemed to be quite the interesting pair, a good fit for a team such as this. However it would appear that one of them did not take too kindly to his early act as his means of identifying the pair through the Garden databases had him on the receiving end of a snappy remark. Jake maintained his cool to avoid adding further fuel to a fiery individuals distaste for what he'd done. "Should of read all the files..." The SeeD mumbled to himself. A lot would happen in the short window of time as one of the two targets was tied up and the other, well the other seemed confident of his ability, until he lost conciousness.

Upon Xerox's word to get ready to move and Rachel's confirmation that he was ready, Jake helped haul the dead weight of Royce up onto the trolley before detaching his crossbow for use as they'd make their way to regroup with the others. It was a good enough formation given the tight quarters, he could help thin out the approaching soldiers with his crossbow while Xerox and Heloise would cover the front, making short work of any who were (un)fortunate enough to make it to them. The SeeD gritted his teeth during a quiet moment before composing himself "You know, although you probably would of got out of here alone, this operation wasn't cheap." Jake was attempting to address Heloise before continuing. "Galbadia and Balamb were both able to put forward able bodies for the situation on a short notice. Trabia needed someone to ensure its interests in the operation were well. I'll delete these once we're all out safe, it needs time to upload to the network."

After climbing back up the stairwells a couple of levels a familiar voice had greeted them. Upon hearing Duncan's questions Jake forced a smile. "Well some of us aren't at least. Things seem to be a little off back at Garden so I can't speak in any official capacity as to the bigwigs intentions. Though it would seem they tried to change the terms of our agreements, which is why I'm here." The SeeD sighed before continuing. "Have you seen a Minerva... Grants?" It was evident that even Jake was unfamiliar with the SeeD he was asking after. "As much as I'd like to continue the joint venture my payment dictates that I'm to verify her well being first." Then there was the second questions answer. "Syrus?... No not him. Another one of your team has come though, Her file is proving quiet difficult to fully decrepit, Eika I believe it was? Very well attuned to the use of magic. Or at least that's what I've gathered from her file."

[Suku]

"I am the person in which you seek." Minerva spoke up it wasn't that odd to find that someone was sent out to look for her despite what she would like to believe otherwise she still needed to go under "disciplinary procedures" for failing her mission which as much as she would like to say no to she sadly had faced such things before. Though looking out and thinking of a plan to safely survive that jump was proving a bit difficult she had a few options one was destroy the prison a bit more and have her GF safely bring her down. Asterius was able to do that much even if it's methods was less than pleasant. Her second option was to dive bomb it and cast float before she hit the ground once again not the best choice but it worked.

[Little_ninja]

With the help from Heliose, Xerox and Heliose quickly took care of the soldiers making their way towards the group. With the group ready to move, Xerox handed Rachel the gun from the cell he had just taken into his ESS. Duncan radioed in, telling them to get their asses up in the next 5 minutes. With the prisoner's strapped into the trolley, he dragged it up, Heliose taking the front, with Xerox near her and Rachel with Jake covering them. Rushing up the stairwell, knocking off any approaching enemies, they met Duncan, hauling Kein over his shoulder.

Being greeted with a "Better late than never." Xerox replied, "Well I was busy getting your drives and hauling these two 'guests'. Don't bother asking about why they're naked. We can get to that later." There was a new face, a dirty blonde, instead of bothering to introduce himself, he nodded to her, acknowledging she was there to help. "Anyway, what's the plan from here?" Xerox asked, stepping over to look over the edge. "You better not be thinking of jumping off. I don't have float magic or a chopper stored away. I really need to start working on that, now that I think about it. Anyway, getting these two down will be the real hassle if we jump off. Not sure I got the equipment to make this thing hover yet." Xerox stated, derailing for a moment. He started handing out the drives to everyone, taking them out of his ESS to hand back.

[Silver Fox]

Ashton Griffone nodded to Duncan at his order before looking out the window in examination. It was quite a drop and she didn't have magic to aid her like a float spell. She had rope in her well prepared backpack but it might not be long enough. Since the magic fields were down, she could probably summon her GF to get her down. It would be the quickest and probably safest way and at this particular moment, speed was key. Plus, Firana could fly. It would be a brief ride, but at least her GF could get her and perhaps a couple of others down.

Soon enough Duncan returned carrying someone and a few of the others seemed to come along as well. The younger black haired individual nodded to her in greeting, in return she gave a friendly smile, waving with her left hand to return the silent greeting. Now that, most were relatively here, she secured her backpack and sniper rifle before focusing and raising her left hand. Ashton moved to the window, squeezing her tall lanky body through before leaping out. Glowing for a moment before flames bursted out and a red fiery griffon appeared outside. Screeing before flapping its wings as it flew right below her, causing her to land on its back. Patting the GF's feathered neck, Ashton directed the griffon near the window. It's foretalons outstretched and opened, offering to grab someone who needed a lift down.

[Lennon79]

Before Duncan could point her out, Minerva made her presence known. 'Well, yeah. There she is. Bit of luck we found her really. Don't suppose there are any other captives we need to find?' At this point he doubted they could make another run down to the prison levels; they had well and truly stirred the hive down there. 'Please say no.' He laid Kein down next to Ashton as she started summoning something, most likely her GF; presumably she had a way down? Oh yes, yes indeed. 'Oh rather... Griff, do us a favour and fly this one down too. He's one of ours, but they've hurt him pretty bad. Probably won't make it if he tries the same way down I'm taking.' He looked up at the taciturn SeeD and gave a thumbs up, not really expecting a reply.

He trotted back over to Xerox, grinning inanely to cover the fact that he had practically ignored everything he said. 'Cheers my dears.' Duncan felt an indescribable feeling of fortitude and relief flow over him as he buckled up his junction drive, once more feeling Artio's reassuring weight in his mind. He could also feel the effects of her junctions bleeding through; his wounds no longer stung and he could think much clearer. Much relief was felt. 'Plan is to jump ship. Literally.' He spared an amused glance at the two naked prisoners. 'They'll be fine and if they're not, I won't shed any tears.' That did leave the Galbadian soldiers, but they would have been trained on aerial insertions anyway. Just like the SeeDs, they would have magic spare for the fall. 'Anyone who doesn't know how to get down or is out of Floats, start thinking outside the box. Make a pool of Water, a bed of Aero, anything.' His lips twisted into a sadistic grin. 'Remember your training and you will make it back alive.'

He finally turned his attention back to Jake as he got an answer for his second question and, oh shit, his blood ran cold. 'E-Eika's here..?' He slowly turned to the open doorway as people started jumping, suddenly quite afraid to make that step. Maybe she had forgiven him for sending her away from Deling City..? Maybe... probably not. For a brief moment he wondered if his chances would be better downstairs with the Galbadians... 'I, uh... I-in any case! Let's go. Gotta get out of the base, then we can worry about... other... things.' He struggled to regain his momentum after that shocking little revelation. He had to move, or else emotion (mainly fear) might root him to the spot. 'Alright, I'm diving.' He took a moment to quickly junction a few Floats to the two prisoners, knowing he had precious few left, before sprinting toward the ledge. He dragged the poor, confused and now terrified Fresno with him over the edge and the two of them fell face-first toward the sand far, far below. The soldier screamed wordlessly, taken utterly by surprise by Duncan's sudden action. Barely a second before they impacted, the SeeD cast a tripled Float on himself, holding onto Fresno with an iron grip as they gently floated down the last few metres. Their feet gently touched the ground and Fresno promptly fell to his knees, vomiting. For his part, Duncan took a deep breath of free air, grinning like an idiot. 'There, that wasn't so bad, was it- oooh, nasty...'

[Zarkun]

Jericho was right behind Duncan, reclaiming his drive and securing it on his person. He smiled as he felt Glaciem's familiar presence in his mind once more and could already feel his reactions getting faster. Stretching a little bit, he watches Duncan jump with the Fresno and slow their descent, but as he turns to Phillips, an evil grin on his face, the man's already out the window on his own, turning and firing a grapple hook onto an upper window ledge and repelling down. Frowning in disappointment, Jericho leaps out the window as well, using two floats to slow his speed and landing at a roll, bringing his pistol up as he comes out of it. "Next time, I say we walk out the front door."

[MarshiestMallow]

Heloise would wait until everyone was down or making their way down, watching to make sure they would get out safely, that no one would try and stop them escaping again. With her daggers, she figured she could keep a few people at bay while the others escaped, and then she flee too. Finally though, she flung herself out the window in a swift motion, unafraid.

She slowed herself with floats, landing softly, coming back up from the crouch she fell in to glance about them, two daggers in her hands, just in case there was something to fight. "what would be the fun in that?" She said in response to Jericho, as her daggers disappeared once more.

[akirashadow]

Having spoken his piece with Duncan it was time to get back to business. The woman he was looking for had identified herself shortly after he had asked of her. The scruffy looking shuffled his way over to the woman as he grabbed his radio. "Overwatch, primary objective complete. Minerva Grants has been located... further more all known active joint strike team members appear to be accounted for." Jake then clipped the radio back to his belt as he stopped just short of Minerva. "Minerva Grants? Jake Firesong, Garden sent me to get you out... clearly they underestimated the skill of this team. If you'd mind standing still for a moment we'll get this out of the way. Scan." As the SeeD spoke a small magical sphere began to rotate in front of Jake's eye as he looked Minerva up and down a walked a few circles around her. "No obvious signs of convincing interrogation... a few bruises, though nothing appears to be too serious..." The SeeD merely commented aloud as the scan spell pointed out, what it could find. "Well then everything seems good." The SeeD reached inside his jacket and pulled from his inner pocket a small envelop. "Congratulations Minerva, I get the pleasure of informing you of Galbadia Gardens decision to promote you. Your capture was deemed as an unforeseen event, it would appear things didn't go as planned." He handed the female SeeD the envelop.

Jake strolled over to the opening as he looked down to the ground below. "Well..." Jake turned and passed the SeeD's still within the prison walls a small wave. "Guess it's time to offer the strike team my services once more." With that said the SeeD let himself drop out from the opening, using a combination of float and aero spells to bring himself to an eased landing, almost instantly into a walk as he did so as he made his way over to Duncan. "It would seem..." Jake was cut short by the sound of Duncan's prisoner or hostage hurling his guts up, the smell wasn't all to pleasant and the SeeD grimaced slightly before continuing. "It would seem my work as assigned by Galbadia Garden is complete. As such I'd like to request permission to rejoin the team." the SeeD extended his hand out to Duncan as if trying to strike some kind of business deal.

[rivaan]

“Well it’s a plan at least… won’t be the first time I had to jump from high places with no equipment.” Rachel mumbled as Duncan jumped with him pulling the other guy. As the others followed after the leader, Rachel threw a quick look backwards. It seemed it was time for her to get going as well. Making a few steps towards the edge she nimbly jumped over.

As she was falling down a list of possible solutions rushed her mind. She always could just summon Castanica. Her GF would stop her fall with little difficulty, but following that idea meant alerting anything within great radius being alerted to their presence outside. The insane GF wasn’t exactly subtle… especially when her mad cries were so incredibly loud. In the end she simply concentrated and threw a float on herself to slow the fall like the others. After a few moments she threw another float and following that another. She gradually slowed her speed to a stop by the time she was at ground level.

In the end she softly landed. She gave a satisfied smile as she was outside that prison. “Cool… now I hope we have an escape route planned to take us to the closest safe house. We need to take care of the injuries.”

[Little_ninja]

Xerox watched Duncan grin towards him. In his mind, Xerox wanted to face palm He hasn't heard a thing I've said, and he forgets that I even told him Eika was here. This guy, sometimes. Seeing as Duncan had generously offered, or rather just used some floats on the prisoners, the trolley they were strapped to was simply pushed off. The trolley didn't seem to rush to it's descent, but was increasing it's speed gradually. As it accelerated, Xerox pulled out a remote, pressing it from time to time. Each time, a small set of rockets decelerated the trolley a little. The rockets weren't enough to stop a full descent, but with the help of the float magic, they managed to decrease the fall speed. In the end it was enough for the trolley to land without killing the prisoners.

With Rue in his arms, Xerox saw a couple of the others jump off before following suit. His paramagic proficiency was the worst of the group. He'd probably use have to concentrate and use almost double of what anyone else used. He didn't even have that many to use. The labcoat he was currently wearing wasn't the same one with the modifications either. However, with all of his things always handily readily to be accessed, he pulled out a chute and held it with one hand, carrying Rue in the other. Slowly they drifted to the ground.

"So, everyone is down, we got our "esteemed guests". Guess all that's left is to get the hell out of here." Xerox stated once everyone had gotten to the ground.

[Suku]

Minerva shivered a little as asterius let her out of its embrace as it materialized on the ground. Sadly it was her safest way down since she didn't want to test her reaction timing with her magic. With that in mind she walked foward to the rest of the group now it was all about getting the hell out of here if she was not mistaken. Still with that in mind she quietly let her gaze sweep the situation was in the clear for now and as long as there was no one left behind they should be able to leave this forsaken prison. "Is that everyone or are we still waiting on someone?" Minerva asked as she looked at Duncan the impromptu leader it seemed.

[Lennon79]

Listening to the team reel off one-liners one after another was oddly refreshing. Maybe he actually liked the cockiness... Not that Duncan was one to talk. He turned to Jake with a stupid grin, just happy to be out of that hellhole. 'My friend, it will be as though you never left. I imagine we'll find plenty to- Oi... what was that..?' He paused, listening closely. There is was again, subtle but definitely there. One of the Galbadian turncoats staggered unsteadily away from the group, muttering angrily. 'I told them this was a dumb idea, I told them they'd get us all killed, why don't nobody ever... listen...' Her voice trailed off as she stared at the sand beneath her feet, like it was draining away underground... Duncan caught on a second too late. 'Oi, move outt-' His warning was cut off by a great thundering sound as the sand beneath the woman's feet fell away, revealing row upon row of serrated teeth rising around her. She didn't even have time to scream.

'Sand worms!' This time it was Fresno who acted first, yelling a warning while pulling a device from his belt. Sand worm attacks were common here, at least outside the perimeter fencing. How did they get in? He didn't have time to think about it now though. 'SeeD, stay completely still!' His mind raced, trying to remember the procedure for worm attacks. 'And run when I run!' He threw the device as hard as he could. It landed with a soft thump a couple dozen metres away, then detonated with huge concussive force. 'Now!' He pelted off in a random direction as the worms fell upon the area, thrashing around as they hunted for whatever made such big vibrations. But they weren't all that stupid; a few peeled off and dove back underground, creating ominous wakes behind them as they homed in on the SeeDs.

Duncan ran along behind the soldier, utterly confused as to what was going on. Did sand worms even exist..? True, there were a lot of undocumented monsters out there, but surely something like this would have been studied before. He glanced over his shoulder, up at the prison behind them; a state secret for housing political dissidents, protected by unknown monsters. Sounded very Galbadian actually. 'Split up!', he yelled. For a moment he wondered if being swallowed by a worm would really kill him outright; SeeDs were pretty tough after all. Then again, it was best not to test it. 'Head for the support team!' He could see some of them now, lining a rocky ridge a few hundred metres ahead. If they hadn't been eaten, then it was a fair bet that it was a safe location. He legged it.

[Zarkun]

Phillips grabbed Jericho and pulled him away from the writhing worms. He was holding a device similar to what Fresno had thrown once already, but he didn't toss it yet, the pair forking out to the right from the group. Jericho, in the meantime, was trying to figure out what the hell was going on and why Galbadia had issues with being a NORMAL dictatorship and putting their top secret prison for political prisoners in a jungle surrounded by quicksand or something like that. "Hey Duncan, when we get back to the Garden, remind me to recommend this place for destruction by missile strike!" Reaching a rock outcrop, Phillips and Jericho hopped up on it, not moving as they watched the sand worms moving around the rocks like sharks. He wanted to try and shoot the bloody things, but even he knew it was pointless.

[Silver Fox]

Looking to Duncan as he instructed to assist the injured man, Ashton gave a brief nod in understanding before patting her GF. The crimson griffon screed before reaching and picking up the injured man gently with its talons then took off and flew down to the ground. The dirty blonde watched the others get down, blinking a little as Duncan literally jumped off with one of the soldiers, effectively freaking him out. It was almost amusing. Landing, Firana set the injured man while the sniper dismounted. Waving her hand and dismissed the GF, watching the creature disappear. Slinging the injured man over her shoulders, she glanced around, grimacing as Sandworms started popping up and effectively eating someone. Standing still as Fresno made a distraction, she soon quickly bolted along with the others, moving apart as Duncan ordered them to split. Great, this was quite the interesting time they were having. Going off into a suicide mission to deliver a message, getting captured and tortured, sneaking around and then running for their lives from soldiers and Sand Worms. Unsure what exactly could top this. Probably did not want to know.

She could feel the sand rumble beneath her feet and she moved faster, though she could feel some of the worms move faster beneath the sand. Blinking her teal eyes as the sand beneath her dipped a bit, her face twisted into one of panic and distaste. Quickly she lept backward as a Sand Worm busted out of the sand that she was standing on. Clenching her teeth, her feet quickly was stepping backwards along the creatures limber body as the worm arched foreword to dive back down in the sand. Annoyed by the steps on it, its limber body switched back in a attempt to nab her but she quickly jumped. Stepping on its head and jumping off to continue running. Quickly climbing up on the rocks with the others and took a few deep calming breaths. Feeling her panicked heart pound against her chest.

[MarshiestMallow]

As things seemed to have calmed down, finally, Kalinda let herself relax, just slightly. She rubbed a hand over her eyes, weary. As the warning for the sand worms came through, Kalinda stood up straight, and had daggers in her hands.

She was the last to move, almost taunting the worms to come at her. As they drew nearer, she began to move, flinging her daggers when any rose to the surface, the small figure darting forward after the others once more, she gathered her strength, and launched herself up, scrambling up the rocks to where the others were.

She flung a dagger at the closet Sand Worm, already figuring she was losing the daggers she threw at them.

[akirashadow]

The sand worm attack had come as a most fascinating surprise to Jake, he'd heard stories from Overwatch reports but most of them were discarded as being merely rumours. The Galbadian SeeD calmly observed the creatures that had easily surrounded the area as he reached for his PDA. Just as the SeeD was about to snap a shot of one of the creatures, an explosion cause by one of the turncoat soldiers had thrown the dusty sand into the line of sight. As the worms thrashed about Jake snapped several quick shots before raising the PDA close to his mouth. "Update Bestiary, entry: Sand Worm." The electronic tune of confirmation could barely be made out in the commotion. "Interesting creatures eh Duncan?.... Mr Fenwick?" The SeeD turned to look at where Duncan had been only to see, like most of the other SeeD he had already made a break for safety. With a sigh Jake glanced and took count of who was yet to start moving before making a dash for it himself.

As the SeeD ran across the desert to safety, he kept himself apart from the others to maintain their spread out formation. The ground rumbled as Sand Works split up and pursued their desired meals. As the quaking gradually became strong Jake stopped himself before taking several leaps back as a worm burst up beneath his route. "Aeroga!" The spell blasted a wall of sand up between Jake and the worm as he circled round the diversion as the creature predictably lunged through the barrier to find its prey had already departed. The SeeD wasted little time scurrying up the rock formation once he'd caught up to the others. "Overwatch if you're seeing this we may be needing some fire support once everyone's regrouped." In the distance the SeeD just barely made out the flicker of light being bounced from the sniper team members scopes, they were ready to act should the need arise, though until the team were gathered in one spot opening fire on the large targets carried to much risk. The SeeD readied his crossbow with one of the modified explosive bolts, carefully watching for an opportunity to plant one within a worms mouth should it present itself.