Jailbreak, Part II: Electric Boogaloo [Daglobster]

[DragonSong]

When she was finally able to get a full breath in she gulped air like she'd been drowning, nearly choking as the sobs rising in her throat redoubled. She managed to roll onto her side, gasping and shaking, and curled her fingers into the red dust by her head.

Slowly, she became aware of her body again. Of the magic pulsing through it, yes--oh stars she never thought she'd feel this whole again--but also the dull throbbing from her ankle, and the by now scorching burn in her throat.

"...Water." Annabelle lifted her head slightly to look at him. Tears still streamed down her face, but she'd managed to get the desperate, broken weeping under control at least. "If you really don't want me dead...I need water."

[Daglobster]

"Water."

Saendyr reached down to his belt and set his spare water canteen down next to her, but otherwise kept his distance like he had before. He alternated between conflicting feelings of wariness and doubt, feelings that he hoped to avoid by taking all the fights against all of TRIM's contained monsters or high-threat fugitives. So now, why was he playing personal kidnapper, to Dr. Farrow of all people?

He picked up his helmet and put it on. It clicked and the environmental seals hissed. With a tap on his temple, Seandyr turned on his thermal optics so he could cut through all the dust and interference.

He was taking a quick survey of their surroundings, but he made sure to keep Annabelle in the corner of his eye.

[DragonSong]

The electro-mage scrabbled for the canteen and gulped down nearly half of it desperately before she remembered that, as dehydrated as she was, she was just as likely to make herself sick if she wasn't careful.

That, and she didn't know how much water they had. And she had no doubts she wasn't going to be high on this operative's rationing list if they started to run low before the dust storm died down. She'd heard the things could last days on this planet.

An automatic, raspy, "Thank you," scratched out of her throat, and then she almost immediately winced. Why the fuck was she thanking him? He was literally her jailer, and was most likely about to be complicit in her murder.

She didn't doubt Farrow would want to keep her around after this. Maybe he'd wanted her brought in alive, but she suspected that was just to get a few last living bioreadings before he disposed of her and decided to just cut her up.

Or maybe he wouldn't. Maybe he'd just keep torturing her for whatever was left of her natural life.

...That seemed worse, so it was probably the correct guess.

Not expecting an answer, she sagged forward and let the canteen droop listlessly from her fingers as she asked, "Why are you doing this? Is it really worth the money?" She wouldn't pretend to know this operative's life, but...she couldn't imagine any pay was worth this.

But maybe she was just naïve. 

[Daglobster]

At the question of the pay, Daersen “hmphed.” to himself, the sound barking out out through his helmet’s comms. The sound filters gave his voice a tinny growl that caused him to sound not too far off from one of those grunting marines in whatever was the newest holoflick.

“For me, not so much. I like a bed and hot meals, don’t need much else,” he said easily, eyes still glued onto the horizons as he searched for a visual frequency that could cut through the storm. He turned his head to acknowledge her with his visor.

“But it keeps the mom and pop comfortable, and safe from people like TRIM, hell yeah it’s worth it.”

He gave up scanning with his helmet, and turned on his heels to go and retrieve his rifle. The scope’s optical housing made his helmet’s visor look like two cups with a piece of string attached to it, so it was his last hope for keeping a good eye out.

“Maybe you haven’t noticed, but I’m a little overqualified for this op. No offense to you, Lightning, but I’m usually recovering real monsters. Even for someone as deep in TRIM as you, there’s ungodly shit you wouldn’t believe you’d even see.”

He chuckled.

“And they got’em locked up with keycards and control chips. No wonder I still have a job.”

[DragonSong]

She stared at him for a long moment, both processing what he said and trying to figure out how to respond. Or if she wanted to.

Finally, she glanced away and muttered, “So my life for your family’s?” Maybe surprisingly, there wasn’t actually any judgement in her voice. She didn’t have anyone like that, anyone who cared about her—or if she did, she didn’t remember—but she imagined she would do just about anything to protect them if she did.

She narrowed her eyes at him as he touted his own qualifications though. She knew better than most just what it would take to bring someone like her down. She was well aware that the good doctor hadn’t been taking any chances when he sent this operative.

“...Annabelle,” she said bluntly, drawing her knees in closer to her chest. “If you’re going to be sending me back there, the least you can give me is the curtesy of my name.” She glanced over at him again, then added in something next to a whisper, “I’m not a monster.”

Though after everything that had happened in the last day...she wasn’t entirely sure she believed that anymore. And that, more than anything else, terrified her.

[Daglobster]

"Annabelle, who's not a monster. No shit," Saendyr said, hoping the gruffness in his voice would help blunt the steadily growing feeling of wrongness that was building in his gut.

"Top brass seems damn convinced of the opposite, though. It doesn't make sense," he said, turning his head back to the storm and his scans. Finally, he found a visual wavelength that cut through the dust and interference, at the cost of making the world grey. Heat and energy caused a lighter shade while the magnetism caused dark splotches to appear in his vision every now and then.

Still, her question cut through to him, even if he didn't show it. Yeah, it was her or his family. Nothing against the poor girl, but it was a relatively easy decision for him, even if he was starting to doubt himself in that regard.

"Someone's invested in you, and it sure as shit isn't that walking human-rights tribune assigned to you."

[DragonSong]

She laughed, rough and tearful, and glared at the rocky wall. “Doesn’t make sense? You just told me I killed two people. I—“

Burned them alive. Cooked in their own armor.

Her stomach turned again, but she managed not to retch. She took a few breaths—in through her nose, out through her mouth—then finally looked back toward her captor.

“…See anything?” It was meant to be something of a snide comment, but there was a bit too much fear lingering beneath her voice for it to really work. She winced, annoyed with herself, and glanced away again.

She tried not to think about what else he’d said. About someone being invested in her. About the voice.

Maybe I’ve finally gone really, truly crazy.

[Daglobster]

"I saw the footage," Saendry said, and looked over to her in the pause leading to his next few words. The helmet lit his face up on the inside, so she'd be able to see his eyes. He didn't look upon her with any form of judgement or hate, instead the look in his eyes was purely analytical.

"The lightning came from your fingers, but you didn't really kill them. Your fear did."

Another short pause.

"Monsters don't kill out of fear or panic," he observed, and he would have said something else, but then his attention was drawn away. She'd be able to see his helmet light up inside, in the direction facing outwards from their shelter. He looked over, and just as quickly ducked his head and dove forwards, landing in the dust several feet from her as the rapid-fire blasts from an energy rifle left soft-ball sized holes in the rocks where Saendyr had just been.

The impacts sent pebbles and dust all over their shelter.

[DragonSong]

That hadn't been what she meant, but before she could clarify that she'd been asking if he saw anything in the storm--or even attempt to process what he'd said about seeing the security footage--her original question was answered rather explosively.

Annabelle cried out, throwing herself to the ground behind her captor. "What the fuck?!"

Magic crackled at her fingertips and she looked around wildly, feeling panic start to set in. She was trapped--they were trapped, but she was bound. Maybe the "recovery agent" could defend himself, but she certainly couldn't in her current state.

"Let me go," she hissed desperately at Saendyr. "Please, you have to untie me!"

[Daglobster]

"The fuck is right," he growled quickly. He'd landed on his side, and so his large frame, along with the added bulk of his powered armor, made a rather easy shield for Annabelle. As he righted himself just enough to spot a crouched figure on his thermal optics, peeking out from behind a not-too-far-off rock He also noticed the shouldered laser rifle, braced against the stone with the barrel trained straight at him.

Saendyr raised his rifle, and the man fired. The ensuing laser bolt went screaming off one of Saendyr's pauldrons, leaving a dark streak and sending Saendyr's aim off and into the man's cover, which drove him down. He didn't even respond to her plea to be let loose, instead already moving to get to his feet.

"Stay behind me," he said curtly, voice even as he rose to his feet and started to strafe sideways towards their shelter's exit. As Saendyr loaded one of his two emergency magazines of lethal ammo for his rifle, he sent out a radar ping from his helmet, and cursed under his breath.

Outnumbered, enemies all over. Yeah, sounds about right. A different enemy popped out from the other side of that same rock and rattled off a few shots from a lighter weapon, which Saendyr took confidently to his armor's chest and arm plates in order to return a devestating three-shot burst from his rifle into the man's chest, sending him scampering backwards on his ass with a bullet through his lung and fucked up torso armor.

Even then, with his focus elsewhere, he didn't notice the looming shape of another attacker at the flank, entering their shelter with a primed vibrosword ready in his hand.

Their attackers wore what seemed to be Aedolian military equipment, but all standards of uniformity were thrown out the window and their equipment appeared weathered.

[DragonSong]

“You can’t leave me like this!” Annabelle shouted desperately even as she struggled to keep herself behind whatever protection his body provided against the enemy fire. She choked on a scream when another energy blast ricocheted off his arm, so close that it nearly burned her cheek; she could hear the buzz of his powered suit like a constant whine in the back of her head, making it difficult to focus.

Wait.

Powered armor.

Saendyr may not have noticed the sword-wielding attacker slipping into their shelter, but with her shoulder turned to the hulk of the fray as she tried to hide behind him, Annabelle certainly did. Her mind snagged on a thought, that one thought—powered armor—and she did something very, very stupid.

She darted out from her cover behind TRIM’s recovery agent, running straight for the ex-soldier. It was a dumb enough move that it gave her a split second of surprise where the man was frozen, unable to react, and that was all she needed.

She moved on instinct, bound hands flying up to slam into his chest as electricity arced from her fingertips—but unlike with the guards back at TRIM, it didn’t even seem to burn him, let alone kill him nigh instantly. Instead, the sparks sank into his armored suit, and Annabelle’s eyes flashed brilliant, electric blue.

“No,” she snarled, crooking her fingers as though she was pulling on the strings of a puppet.

And the man swung in place, movements sharp and jerking, trying to resist as his armor moved under her command. She forced him forward, into the line of fire, hoping his companions would see and stop shooting long enough for them to come up with a better plan.

Because she didn’t think she could keep this up very long; she’d never been a particularly powerful mage, and she had only just gotten full control of her abilities back. Not to mention she had absolutely no idea how she was doing this.

[Daglobster]

Saendyr tried to focus on the conflict in front of him and tried to drown out Annabelle's voice. Of course, she'd just love for him to uncuff her and take his attention back off of her, but unfortunately for her, he was a little busy. Even if he wanted to unshackle her, he wasn't going to just turn his back to enemy combatants and start playing with his PDA.

His sensors read movement behind him, and he swiveled his head back, laying down a few bursts towards the enemies still in front of him to keep them down while he glanced. When he saw Annabelle lunging straight for a man in power armor, and then saw her fling him around like a puppet...

All he could do was just get down out of the way as a grown man in Aedolian shock-trooper power armor came flinging around like a feather blown in the breeze. He was cursing and his friends seemed surprised. One of them didn't even get his barrel up in time and sent a few rounds skidding across his armor.

The uninjured assailant tried to lean out of his cover to get around his levitating comrade, and Saendyr kicked the man forwards and leveled his rifle. This time, his shots rang true and a swift five-round burst laid the would-be flanker down.

More fire came from some more approaching combatants, and Saendyr made the decision to pull backwards after a streaking slug slammed directly into his chest and he felt pain as armor buckled, but held. He turned away from the impact and slid further into cover. He looked to Annabelle as he pulled the still-smoking slug round out of his chest-plate.

"You want the cuffs off? Now's your chance!"

[DragonSong]

With a desperate, wordless cry, Annabelle flung the mercenary forward into the stretch of space between their shelter and their attackers as she felt her control over the armor flicker and fade. She collapsed to her knees, panting, and just barely had the presence of mind to register that man had tumbled and skidded a good few yards before coming to a stop in an ungainly heap.

No time to hold still.

Panting, she managed to scramble awkwardly to her feet and stagger the few steps needed to close the distance between her and Saendyr before her knees buckled again and she wound up practically collapsing into him before she frantically righted herself and thrust her bound wrists up into his face. Her expression was a mix of panic and anger, eyes a bright, burning blue that seemed at odds with the red dust swirling around them.

"Off. Now."

[Daglobster]

The man went flying forwards, suddenly very familiar with what it was like to become a projectile. He tried to catch himself on his arms but that just made him tumble into the ground even more wildly. He came to a hard stop against the large rock his friends were covering against and fell limp, knocked into a daze at the very least, although Saendyr wouldn't have cried if the guy had broken his neck, either. The guy laid out by Saendyr's shots was still alive, although the way he groaned on the ground and tried to pull himself behind cover didn't bode too well.

Sendyr stayed knelt behind the cover, grabbing Annabelle by the scruff of her clothes and pulling her up the rest of the way when her stumble had not covered all of the distance needed and collapsed. He kept her down with a strong arm as he prepared a small canister from his belt. He threw the ten-banger over their low cover and whispered a quick "eyes down" to her. The small area behind their cover was sheltered from an otherwise blisteringly bright light that strobed out of the cylinder to an accompanying cacophony of loud bangs, like several loud rifles going off at a random, disjointed rhythm.

The effect was near instantaneous and Saendyr hoped it'd give him the time he needed to whip out his PDA, punch in his access code, and scan her handcuffs, which promptly popped off of her wrists and fell to the ground with an understated clunk.

[DragonSong]

Annabelle gave a rather plaintive, indignant little noise when he grabbed her by the collar to haul her into safety. Still, she ducked her head and raised her bound hands to shield her eyes as best she could at his order.

"What was that?" she demanded, debating if it was worth the risk of trying to peek out from their little shelter and see what had just happened.

Then her cuffs were off, and the relief that swamped her nearly buckled her knees again. She forced herself to get a grip and flexed her fingers, watching sparks of white light dance over her fingertips.

She could run. Her captor was wearing enough tech that she knew it would be fairly simple for her to short it out with a quick burst of electricity, buy herself enough time to at least get a head start. She could...

But she wouldn't make it far in this storm. Or even passed their assailants, most likely.

"Who are they?" she muttered, looking to Saendyr as though he might have answers. And are they after me, or you?

[Daglobster]

Saendyr watched her flex her fingers to coax delicate arcs of lightning in between them, and part of him wondered if he'd just made a critical mistake in response to pressure in the field. It wouldn't be the first time, but damn, it was something a rookie would do.

Still, if she helped him and didn't just turn those fingers on him, then he might just have a chance of surviving this.

"Aedolians," Saendyr said easily. Once the strobe-grenade had finished, Saendyr popped back up to see that more enemies had advanced up. He took a few shots, sending one man hiding behind a vertical spike of rock, but the other two advanced and laid down some shots, one of them being the same man who'd fired the slug from before.

Saendyr crouched down as shots thumped and crackled into the rocks in front and behind them. He angled his arms up and blind-fired the rest of his magazine to keep the enemies at bay, bringing the gun back down when it was finally time to reload.

"Definitely not active service."

No more live rounds, now he was down to the stick-and-shocks and tranqs.

[DragonSong]

"Okay, but why are they here?" Annabelle muttered. "TRIM doesn't usually send more than one recovery team, so not that. And they wouldn't put out a public bounty, so they're not random mercs, unless they're here for you--"

She might have been babbling a bit. But it was fairly clear from her wide eyes and the way her skin had blanched under its layer of dust that she was tiptoeing toward true panic, and working through the situation out loud was allowing her to keep her mind focused, for the moment at least.

Magic sparked along her body, following the line of her spine down to the small of her back and making her shiver. Her fingers twitched, itching to release a bolt of electricity, but she curled them tight into her palms. She was afraid, and untrained, and had no idea what was going on. If she just let her magic out like she had last time, odds were she was going to kill someone. Possibly multiple someones.

Her eyes suddenly sharpened a bit and she looked to her captor. "They're not active service...but you were, weren't you?" He certainly spoke with more authority and vague jargon than she'd have expected from one of TRIM's contract-hunters. "How do you know they're Aedolian?"

[Daglobster]

"I used to wear that armor," Saendyr said easily. He brought up the tactical pad on his wrist and turned on his armor's shoulder-mount weapon, the net projector. in the corner of his helmet's visor, there was a display that allowed him to track the motion of nearby creatures as circular blips and lines.

"TRIM cleaned my records. No bounties, either," he said, but quickly quieted down once the time to strike approached.

The opponents quickly pressed their perceived advantage, and as soon as someone started to close in on them he stood just enough to expose the shoulder-weapon, which swiveled and fired a net at the man with the shotgun. The net was wide enough to wrap around even someone in full power armor, and the electrodes came alive with a sharp crackle and the woman (by the sounds of the voice from inside the helmet) fell over.

He rose the rest of the way, and shielded his visor with a forearm as he flicked a thin disc out from his belt and threw it into the open space ahead. A few shots from the enemies flew past and even skidded off his vambrace and shoulder armor, but a pearlescent, dome-shaped force-field formed and absorbed the rest of the gunfire.

Containment fields were meant for capturing large creatures, but a barrier was a barrier in this case. With the way blocked (for now), Saendyr started pacing backwards.

"Come on, this way!" he said, sparing the still shaking assailant on the ground a passing glance to make sure they were still alive before turning to lead Annabelle away.

[DragonSong]

Completely unused to combat of any kind--and surrounded by people who were clearly very used to it--Annabelle found she could do nothing but what she was told. It was her best chance at staying alive, as far as she could see. At least for the moment.

She had what felt like a thousand questions burning on her tongue, but she bit them back, just giving Saendyr a sharp look and a small nod when he called for her to follow.

She had no way of navigating the dust storm they were heading out into on her own, and could only hope that he did. Breathing deeply once, twice, in an effort to steady her magic, she darted after him, squinting against the wind and red earth.

"Where are we going?!" She had to raise her voice louder than she wanted just to be heard over the wind.

[Daglobster]

Saendyr had to really crank the range back on his personal radar. Anything that went out too far was scrambled by the storm, but Saendyr was hoping that his more modern armor would outperform the enemy's surplus suits in this regard.

"Looking for cover!" Saendyr said. If they had any chance of outfoxing their attackers, they'd have to stay moving in order to keep from being surrounded. If Annabelle had not covered his back from the swordsman, things could've gotten much uglier.

The storm was thick, so Saendyr made sure to keep pace with Annabelle, ushering her along with a hand between her shoulders as he swept his rifle about in search of targets, waiting for assailants to come barreling out of the storm.

He singled out another batch of rocks, and hustled the two of them along until they could both take cover from the storm once again. He took the magazine out of his rifle and switched it with a new one, cursing when he saw he was down to his stick-and-shocks. The delicate tranq shots weren't even in the equation for this.

"These are no good against power armor, even on the highest setting." he said, showing Annabelle the bullets tipped with what looked like electrical conduits and spikes before slid it into his rifle and racked the slide back.

The barrel of his rifle crackled as the adaptive systems switched up to charge the electronically fired rounds.

"If I land the shots, can you make them hurt?" he said, looking to her through his visor.