Remnants of the Earth
TEINAR => Wastelands => Topic started by: Enkashi on July 04, 2013, 08:09:26 am
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The desolate Wasteland deserved the upper-case W. In all her years in Heivah... she'd never imagined how... dead it was. The planet was very, very sick... and it was like... well, it was like seeing the sky! Bubbling black swamps, acid rain-stricken forests, and now... an eroded, ruined old city. Even as she walked down an ancient thoroughfare, as the dirt crunched under her feet and dust whipped up her dark- hooded traveling cloak and labored her respirator, she could hear the creak and groan of ancient skyscrapers as they settled into the desolation of eternity.
Just the same, in the fading twilight walking into the sunset, she felt... curiously reverent. She'd heard once that in deserts, men found religion, that when the sky stretched forever onward in all directions, they felt a pressing need to look up and feel there was someone between them and forever. Edyth hadn't been raised to think of gods as things to be desired... but after all that happened, she wondered if people didn't need them - if in their absence, they ruined the world, they destroyed everything? It was a thought. She could do with the company of a voice in her heart telling her everything was going to be alright.
A part of her wanted to believe that - but as a lifelong mouse chasing cheese that is just around the corner... she'd learned that there are only corners for people like her, and a distinct absence... of cheese. So why was she going out to Teinar again? Well... it was a long way from the Pilots, and the Aedolians couldn't reliably find the place. The culture lived in something approaching secret out here in the wastelands. They had technology too... some, anyway. From what the man who called himself the Ferryman had said they didn't like psychics much... but she didn't like them much either, so maybe that balanced out. She, in her heart of hearts, suspected not.
Just the same it was her only damn lead, and she had to follow where it lead - that was the wretched truth of it. So, she'd traded for the mask, used her powers to figure it and its disposable figures out, and set off. The mutant creatures here were... a bit of a shock at first, and some she'd done her very best to avoid, but they were alright when cooked, and she was amazed to find that there was a kind of satisfaction to be derived from hunting them with her powers. She'd come out here with not even a weapon or any armor...
... and kill them with her mind.
Despite herself... she grinned a little, and wondered if she shouldn't attempt to live out here. She could easily filter her own water - copying one with her powers was simple as pie... and filters? No problem there either. Sure some creatures were too much - but she knew what they sounded like... and her powers were still growing. The more she used them... the stronger they -- she! -- got! Maybe someday... maybe someday she'd take revenge. Maybe... maybe she really could still root out all the corruption, the evil in her government, root out the dragons...? She furrowed her brow... yeah. Someday, they'd pay. The network would... would...
She stopped dead for a moment. Instincts that had only just started to form... told her that she was in danger. The crumbling skyscrapers all around her creaked and groaned... but no cries came. Even the quiet ones made... SOME sound. She could wake up now at their mere presence after that first night. She still shuddered when she thought about it... but this was different. She knew well what being watched was... and she was being. Someone was watching her...
... and not to greet her warmly.
She tensed, turning this way and that, feeling her power coming gradually, like the tension of a muscle just before movement.
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Vakar had spent a whole week eating these mutated things. They disgusted him beyond belief, but the mutagens and the radiation did nothing to him. The nano-bots simply cured him. He could, in essence, eat anything here. It was just hell trying to catch the buggers. Vakar even wondered how they had gotten into this state, to be so badly mutated that they were no longer species, just random individuals, mutated beyond being identifiable.
It was difficult. The city was inhabited, but he was driven out, his nano-suit making him a threat. So he was forced to leave the city. But he had come across a bounty put out for an "Iron Golem", an ex-TRIM subject, like him.
She was a ticket to the TRIM facility, to his past. Even if it meant she suffered, he needed to go back, he needed to find his past. He remembered nothing. He didn't have a single memento, just his name.
And so, when he saw the woman matching the description he decided to hunt her. He activated his cloak, and tried to follow her. He wasn't perfectly invisible, but he was very well concealed. Hopefully she wouldn't see the haze that was him.
He unfolded his rifle, and flipped the switch for the laser, pointing it for a leg shot.
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Honestly, Edyth never saw this coming.
The shot came with a KRAKOOOOM that was heard only after she felt a sharp pain in her thigh and was knocked to the ground, her legs coming right out from under her! She hit the ground with her head and shoulder blades - it was only a small mercy that the ground was sand, and not like... debris or something. She coughed as the breath was knocked out of her all in one go, but managed to look at her leg all the same, reflexively reaching for it. It hurt like blazes, but the bullet had gone right through and mercifully, she wasn't bleeding... tons and tons. She tried to move it, and though it complained considerably... she could do so.
Okay, what were her options? Someone was out there, and she'd been shot from behind. Amidst the pain, tears already beaded in the corners of her eyes, she tried to focus as she'd been taught, to concentrate. They'd shot her in the thigh to start with. That meant they were interested in talking. But they'd shot her - that wasn't very nice. Teinar, from what she'd heard, was not very militant as a rule. Arching her back and looking behind, she saw... well, little dunes mostly, but... she didn't see anyone.
Somehow, that wasn't comforting... Men turning invisible... well, she'd seen that once before. It had been when she was leaving TRIM, when she was nearly at the exit of the facility. Suddenly things went dark, and the darkness tried to kill her, and all she'd been able to see was... shifting mist. And now that she was looking for it (entirely because she still woke up in cold sweats about those things) she was certain that she saw it.
Rage came quickly and easily. So this was TRIM then? The power came easily, and despite the protests of her leg, blue light surged from her eyes and soaked into her skin quite quickly. Anger helped! Licks of lightning screamed at the sands around her, illuminating the twilight area for twenty feet. The girl rose off the ground slowly, levitating upward slowly and righting herself, turning slowly until she was glaring directly at him with eyes that blazed with blue light.
"Alright" her voice said through her respirator. "Come and get it."
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Vakar's shot had been clean. Good. Lack of damage, merely a simple shoot and grab. Except for the fact she was now a human lightning rod of death. The rifle was merely a standard sniper, but he had modified it heavily. Now it was a bolt action rifle. And that would be useless.
He threw the sniper away, watching it exit cloak, and moved from where he stood, no 30 feet away. He would be slightly more visible while moving, but he could switch the suit from cloak to armour almost instantly if necessary. Although the electricity would be a huge issue.
Inside his helmet, he studied the display with a wrenching feeling in his gut.
"R.H.I., check your database for what TRIM program she is from. And try and redirect that electricity as much as possible if I have to get in close." Vakar drew the pistol that he had stolen from the TRIM bounty hunter. No match for a nano-soldier.
The voice that was R.H.I. had an almost evil essence to it, being dark and quite growly.
"Searching database now. Match found."
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R.H.I. turned up... Very nearly nothing about the girl - a sure sign that there was something worth concealing as far as TRIM was concerned. She was tied to a special project called "Project Hephaestus"... To which she was the sole subject of... and it was established when she was inducted. Apart from that, she was just someone named Edyth, a girl from Heivah and... a former pilot candidate well into her training.
Her bounty posting was much more informative, however - she was considered an Alpha mutant (one with a humanoid form and a powerful ability) and a tier 4 psion with an ability that was not mentioned. She was however to be considered armed and extremely dangerous. 15 million for her, dead or alive, and a security rating of -1.3 (normally reserved for things like entire raider groups, giant rampaging monsters or mutant dragons) had been earned appearantly overnight - just from her being loose on the world she'd gotten that kind of rating.
And here she stood, glaring in his direction, her radiant eyes losing detail even as she glared.
"I can see you!" She lied. Her hand was thrust out in front of her as if she had a gun... And the blue energy rapidly condensed into her hands, shimmering black metal taking shape... And forming an approxomation of a TRIM pistol very nearly identical to the one he himself held! The woman waved the newly formed weapon uncertainly, backing away towards cover.
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R.H.I.'s software analysed her voice patterns, aiming to detect any bluff being called. The software was buggy, but good.
"Her call is a bluff. Recommended action: move, test to see if her handgun follows, if not, call buff, and shoot her arm. If she follows you, do not call bluff, and wait for an opportunity to strike." The computer voice resounded through the helmet, incapable of reaching the outside world from the suit computer. A personal Robotic Hud Intelligence was always useful.
Vakar studied the profile extensively. Her bounty posting was extremely informative to him.
He walked sideways, testing to see if her bluff was all that true.
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Edyth was staring in the right direction, and no matter how good the stealth system, dust was dust and gravity was gravity. The man's foot nudged the dirt and kicked a little up. Her eyes flickered to the man's feet then up with viper quickness, and she fired, right where she judged a sneaky bugger's chest might be. A headshot was an unlikely result of such a shot, and she could indeed see the rising mist of... something, but there it was - a chest was the widest, biggest part of someone.
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The shot was unexpected and very accurate. The suit took over electrical functions, and changed to armour mode just in time to stop the shot being lethal. But it still hurt him. He flew backwards, his pistol getting thrown nearby, and now he was visible. He kept the armour on, in case any more shots came at him.
He grabbed his pistol, rolling over. He aimed the weapon, and fired, the aiming period being too long to even try for a headshot. Instead he simply aimed to fire at her, and hit her, down her enough to bag her and get to TRIM.
"Tactical reconsideration: kill subject, claim dead bounty from TRIM. Shot analysis, energy bolt, psionic, subject known psionic user. Proceed with caution." Vakar, disliking the current tone of voice, decided to upgrade R.H.I.'s voice module, as it was rather masculine for a female AI. And rather frightening too. Perhaps upgrade to something sexier.
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((Some music! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZqNUo6y52Q)))
Hit! She felt her heart leap as the man flew backward and flicker into view. She honestly thought she'd killed him, and would have felt worse about it if she'd not been shot in the thigh already, but there it was - bastard deserved it, he'd just shot her, probably to claim her bounty. But her elation was short lived.
She tensed and took a step back as the man survived the hit, rolled dexterously and fired again! She barely had time to squeak before the bullet struck her full-on in the chest, knocking her like he'd punched her... but she didn't drop. The bullet felt like she'd been struck, but... it did not even penetrate her skin, even if she'd have a huge welt there later that would turn all manner of bruise colors. She held the injury though all the same - that was a TRIM weapon, she was certain of it - she held the same gun in her hand even now! At least... her own version of it.
Most things run when they've been shot - but she stuck out her free hand... and another gun, quite like the first began to form as a black, glittering mist began to swirl around her, shimmering and dancing with neon blue lightning like a sandstorm. Plates were starting to form in the air around her as she began to fire at the man, raining two bullets from each weapon in his direction with no kind of precision, just a serious need to kill him dead.
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((I was thinking more along the lines of this music (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fDBVfBCnXg)))
The suit went into overdrive, using the power to roll over, then jump up, reactivating the armour, while simultaneously drawing power to put the suit into power mode. He sprinted forward, throwing the pistol away, ready to attack her in close combat. He would kill her if he really needed to, but if she was easy to subdue, he would kill.
"I don't want to fight you, but I need to hand you in!" He shouted, the suit putting on a slightly more menacing voice thanks to the lack of ability to actually talk through the helmet, instead playing through a speaker. ((For a voice reference, see Master Chief for Vakar, and Soundwave for R.H.I.))
The first punch he threw was aimed at her face, and was a powerful right hook.
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Every shot hit only air, and the would-be assassin closed the distance with frightening speed, saying he didn't want to kill her... But had to turn her in? The incongruity of this made her start for a moment, but that was just enough for his fist to hit her full on upside the head, sending her somersaulting, stunned, through a crumbling wall.
In the air, she regained her composure, and, as the ground sailed past, she reached out and sank her now armored hands into the dust, ripping up the ground considerably as clawed arms of metal and blue light two sizes too large for her lithe form gripped the ground with a rumble and she planted her feet.
"Oh really? Feel like LINING YOUR POCKET?!" She howled, and stood, the black glittering dust rapidly condensing over her form as energy earthed itself violently. When she next came out of the hole she'd made, she was barely visible inside the black metal, already seemingly a foot taller. The air was tingly with power now, and still black glitter danced around her form, which was still growing and shifting as she advanced on him with terrible speed.
"NOPE!" She roared, her voice modulating as the sheer tazer energy played merry hell with the sound waves that issue from her. She sparta-kicked at him, aiming with viper speed a foot the size of a tree stump at his chest.
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The blow sent him flying a good few hundred feet. It hurt, and the HUD display was crackling, distorting and blasting errors in his face. The nanites would repair it, eventually, but he felt one of his ribs crack, and knew the nanites would take a minute to flow through his blood stream to get round too casting it.
The electrical and sound energy had physically stunned him before the blow landed. He guessed that ranged combat would be his only option. Once he had recovered anyway. The suit had locked up to stop him dying, becoming an unbreakable shell, just a model of a position. The suit unlocked, and as his limbs fell into place he felt the true extent of the damage.
Minor bones of all sorts cracked and broke, and he couldn't actually move. He was in agony, but he had to move through the pain. He would fight still.
"I don't want money. In case you didn't notice, my abilities make me more than capable of earning it as a mercenary. Of course, you wouldn't understand. You're an experiment gone wrong. I'm one that went right. You'd be surprised how much it means I've lost. So I NEED to hand you in. Come quietly, and it will be easier."
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"Please" came her modulated reply. She shook he head, and the iron golem did the same. She raised her massive arm in his direction, expression locked in a state of scowl insofar as that could be seen. On the end of her arm, a tube formed, and around it took shape a sort of series of cyllenders, in each formed a ball of crackling energy that was quickly encased in metal even as she concentrated on the task at hand.
"You're a lap dog. I will never return there except to fucking destroy it." She said, and with a loud THUNK she slotted one of the grenades on the launcher into place, sighting him down.
"Give me a reason, puppy. Go on. Breathe wrong!"
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"No. I won't waste my time with a test tube accident. You can come willingly, and I might even try to help you when we get there. Or we can fight." The nanites got to the broken bones, and casted them. They would heal now.
He got up, not stepping away or approaching, but standing his ground, his armoured form a silent guardian.
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The Iron Golem dropped her arm, and the weapon disappeared. She could have gotten angry. She could have attacked and bellowed and probably she would have messed him up, maybe killed him. Probably. But hearing him, all she could see was something desperate.
"Why." She asked simply. "You just said you don't have time for a 'test tube accident'. What am I to you?" She narrowed her eyes on him and glared. "Here's a true story - TRIM is evil, the end. What makes you even think they'd deal with you, 'Mr. Badass assassin' or whatever you think you are - you go back... And you'll just get nicked. I just kicked your ass, and I only just got out with my life."
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"You act as if I don't know that TRIM is evil. What stands before you is probably their only successful experiment in years. They took my past from me and I want it back. If people have to die along the way, so be it. TRIM changed me. They can deal with their monster, not the man I once was. I don't know who I once was. Somewhere out there, someone who once knew me has wondered where I've gone. Now you can come quietly, and accept your fate as a TRIM experiment, like I have, or I can give them your corpse to play with. Never know. If you come quietly they might give me an upgrade or two..." Vakar wasn't trying to win her over, or justify. He was beyond that. He was trying to command. It felt natural to him. It felt like he used to do it. Perhaps sergeant's held a specific rank in TRIM guards. Or Thanatos INC. Special Forces.
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Eddie listened. Had she expected this? Well... Yes, she had. This man was... What she was not. He WAS a monster - a thing made by TRIM's science. He called her a failed experiment, but that was ironic as hell, she realized. They hadn't made her - she was certain of that. She was sold to them it was true - and they'd done a lot to torment her, to test her, and test things on her. She ha no idea what it had been about - she was far too busy screaming to think about their intentions.
"You know..." She said, advancing on him like she was in no hurry whatsoever. She was nowhere to be seen inside the Iron Golem now. "That's whats funny about this, isn't it? You call me failure... Like you think they made me what I am." She shook her head at him as power kissed the ground around her, roared from her in great crackling bolts.
"The difference between us is this - they didn't make me. They don't have their hands up my ass, you butt-puppet. Even now that you're free, you're still doing their dirty work." She stopped maybe ten feet from him, glaring.
"You are the failed prototype, the escape test tube failure. Not me. You're only worth the spare parts." The golem's expression softened a bit.
"So here's a couple choices for you. You can give up on them and be free - you are who you are now, who the hell cares who you were? As you said, you could make a killing as a mercenary. think about that a minute - and you might even find your past in the process. a short time out in the world again hs taught me that money talks - the right money in the tight hands and you can get what you want. i thought I wanted my past, so I sought it out. we can both see how well that worked... but maybe you'll have better luck. Or."
And here, she simply turned around and started to walk away. "You can attack me, or walk away. I won't come with you - and I seriously doubt you have the power to make me."
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"So maybe you're not made by them, but you damn well belong there, you psionic freak. There is no other way. If I have to fight you to drag your corpse there, so be it." Vakar was shouting, and made a dash for his gun. He turned the power on, and it bolstered his speed. He was sprinting at a good 30 mph.
He made a running slide, grabbing his gun as he went past, and started shooting. He aimed shots just at her, not anywhere in particular.
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The hulking figure of blue light and black metal simply kept walking as the man shouted terrible threats at her, and when she heard him moving, she knew she'd pegged him dead on. He wouldn't let it go - he would try and press. And she would not give him the pleasure. Sure... she was almost certain she could take him to the cleaners if she really desired it... but as it stood, she saw too much of herself in him, and it mortified her to her boots. Was this what she could have been?
"You're nothing but an angry little boy." she muttered sourly as the bullets struck the thick armored metal. Nevermind that the metal was harder than most other materials - it was also thick, and suspended on an energy core which itself had glittering black motes within. At her size... she didn't even feel them bounce off and ricochet madly - she just kept plodding on. As it stood, she didn't see him as any sort of threat - just a nuisance. Her leg hurt like blazes... she was bleeding, or she would be when the energy stopped holding it in... but maybe she could hold on until she clotted up and sealed naturally? That was a more pressing concern than some dinky pistol.
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"Get out of your metal suit and fight me then. Go on. I would remove my suit if I knew I could. But it is fused to me. A second skin. But, for the sake of fairness, I'll take the helmet off." He removed the helmet, revealing the connection, where the suit connected to the skin.
It showed off as a line of mechanical stitching on his jaw, coating the underside of his neck. His dark hair wasn't long enough to blow about, and was short. His eyes had a bright blue glow, from cybernetics. There were several stitch marks on his face, and a scar on his right cheek. All in all, he was the TRIM Frankenstein, a patchwork monster.
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Edyth shook her head as she trundled along. She wasn't fast, but she did not have to be - she was in no real terrible hurry to get anywhere.
"You have nothing, nothing to threaten me with." she said, not even turning to face him. "Just leave me alone - you cannot beat me, and I have limited supplies of patience.." She said, her footfalls massive in the dust, her massive iron form reaching a kind of equilibrium at twelve feet tall.
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Vakar turned the cloak on, being but a shimmer in the air now. He decided to drain the power, and sprinted. He would be very hard to spot. He ran as fast as he could, getting behind her, and running up her back.
He clasped his hands on her head, going for a neck snap. He needed to get to TRIM. If she was one of the pile of dead, that was fine with him.
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Eddie did not see the sudden explosion of aggression coming in the least, and he managed to get on her back and grab her head before she reacted. "BWUH!" She cried, and started to stagger as he attempted to wrench on her head in an attempt to find out which way it would come off! She had the backing of the field around her, and the energy licked off of the attacker in buzzing arcs as she stumbled about, crashing into a couple walls.
To an outsider, it might have looked almost comical - like a cowboy trying to tame a giant robot by gripping it by the head! She was stronger than he was like this - quite a lot stronger, but it was one set of muscles backed up by the equivalent of a mech suit's actuators versus one man's entire body strength backed up by a nanosuit - a battle of will, with neither at the advantage. Electricity arced wildly between him and her body, but she was gradually getting presence of mind back as the struggle carried on.
Reaching up, she grabbed at the man, aiming to crush him. Each hand was more than strong enough to manage this - and she was using both of them.
"Gah! Gerroff!"
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The arcs of electricity played hell with the suit's systems, and now he had no HUD. No ammo count or energy bar, no target displays, R.H.I. was offline, and he was now getting electrocuted. The grip was crushing, and the only thing he had as a weapon was the damn pistol. And a single sticky grenade...
His arms were trapped in the grip, but he managed to grab the grenade. Activating the armour mode, losing the strength and invisibility, he stuck the grenade to her hand, listening to the beep repeatedly get faster.
Armour mode was specifically built for surviving blasts and bullets. Energy and plasma still affected him, but conventional bullets didn't. They crumpled and bounced off.
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When the grenade ruptured and its blast was heard even in the distant reaches of the ruins, Edyth was thrown to the ground, skidding a considerable distance in her suit, the hand of the Iron Golem blown to smithereens, leaving her real hand buzzing and tingling with pain like a thousand needles sticking into it. But, at least that infernal man was thrown aside as well!
Amidst the shellshock, the ringing, the hurt inside as her organs dealt with all that vibration, and the blurring of her vision, the Iron Golem stood unsteadily. Still muzzy as hell, the hulking figure shambled towards the warrior on the ground, numb murder in her eyes as she picked up an old stop sign in passing, moving like she wanted to make the slapshot of the century, giving a mighty swing at the nanosoldier!
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The blow with the stop sign sent him packing. It hurt too much for him to go back. And considering the distance he had flown, it would be stupid to walk back for more.
He got up, groaning painfully, his face slightly burnt. He would recover.
"If I see you again, you will die, hear me Iron Golem?!" He shouted. Then he slowly began to make his way to Teinar's main city.
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Edyth had had enough. This one would be a thorn in her side forever unless she dealt with him now a dark part of her insisted - the beast bit of her, the part that saw her freed from TRIM, that let her kill those TRIM operatives they sent after her and not shed a tear. She raised the arm that wasn't numb, and the grenade launcher she'd formed before took shape once more, the tubes training on the retreating figure of the bounty hunter.
Then... drifted to the side a little, her aim shifting to the standing structure he was passing. IT looked sturdy enough, but... one stiff grenade into its hull, maybe two and it'd come toppling down.
She almost did it. She hurt all over, bled from her mouth a little bit - but... but... Looking away, Eddie diverted her aim just off course, and fired once, then twice. The grenades went off with thunderous crashes into the hull of the shattered building, and it came tumbling down... but instead of making a spirited attempt at crushing her bounty hunter as she'd intended originally, it just fell between him and her, toppling into a second, which fell in sequence like a domino, spraying tons of dust and debris everywhere in the dust.
Eddie turned as the cloud of dust rolled over her hulking form... and set to walking again, shoulders slumped with exhaustion and disgust. Why had she let him live? Tch...
... Maybe she saw a bit of herself in him? Who knows - maybe he'd find what he was looking for? She had to give him that chance.