A shot in the dark

[Icos El-Elron]

Icos pressed his hand against the door to feel for heat, there was none thankfully, he went to open the door before noticing it was locked. Taking a step back he raised his leg and kicked the door with all of his strength, throwing the door off its hinges and into the room. He raised his revolver high as glanced around the room; there were a stunning amount of thick wooden boxes just laying around and a horrible stench that overwhelmed even the smoke that was rising from the small fire that was beginning to grow in the corner of the room.

"What the hell?" Icos questioned as he briefly thought the Collector lied to him. Briefly, for as his eyes scanned the dark room he came to realize that some of the boxes were moving a bit with the faint noise of people whining. "Holy shit..." Icos gasped, "Get the boxes open!"

With the fire not far behind Icos rushed to the nearest box and tried his best to get the lock off. After his finger fumbled for a bit he took his knife out and jammed it into the small lock until it snapped to pieces. Throwing the box open he came face to face with a man so weak and malnourished, covered in his own feces and on the edge of death. Icos would have thought he was done if not for the fact he reached his hand out towards Icos.

This even managed to shock the battle hardened Imperial.

--
Natalia dug through the pack that the dead Collector had and pulled out another clip, quickly loading it into the gun she began to resume firing down upon the Collectors. They were beginning to break, falling out from the courtyard as more and more flooded out. She was shocked at the amount of kids they had within their ranks, those who weren't truly ready to see combat and were currently running for their lives. 

She imagined there was no really option for most of these kids. To Chameno was excellent recruiting ground for all its desperate and weak people.

Natalia pulled down the bolt and realigned her sight before squeezing the trigger and firing upon her next victim.

[Tanya O'Douette]

Tanya charged in after Icos, briefly taken aback by the mixture of horrid smells around them. It didn't take her long to take note of the boxes scattered around the room, though as her eyes fell on one she heard Icos give the order to get them open. Seeing the man tear into the lock with a knife she looked at the lock on the boxes herself, coming up close to one that she could hear one of many whimpers from. She didn't have a knife on her, and she sure didn't trust herself to dig into a lock like the Imperial man was even if she did have one. She was halfway through looking around for something to open the lock when she realized she was dangling her revolver by her side yet and with little thought put into it she aimed the gun along the side of the lock and with the pull of the trigger blew the stupid thing apart.

From there, she didn't even check to see if the boxes had any life in them beforehand. She began making quick work of all of them she came across, the smoke tickling at her heavily as she coughed, blowing the locks off and swinging the boxes open frantically to try to help pull out anyone and everyone who was still alive.

[Icos El-Elron]

Some of the boxes they opened reveal lively fellows, others nearly dead and many simply dead already. None of them were Hoch, which Icos was plainly aware of and it bothered him somewhat as well. Finally as they came to their last couple of boxes, Icos slammed the knife into the lock twice and it came right off, he threw the lock aside and opened the box to reveal the Dwarv Minor Tanya had fought so desperately to find. 

"Tanya..." Icos called back to the girl. Icos stared down with a grim face at the Dwarv Minor who simply wouldn't move. Icos figured the little guy just couldn't take it, he looked terribly malnourished and smelled just as bad as everyone else. Icos reached down to take out the dead body, wrapping his hands around the small creature and began to pull it out...

...When its eyes suddenly opened to look over at the two. "No!" He hissed out in fear as he struggled in Icos's hands with little effort.

"Whoa, whoa, relax!" Icos yelled as the guy thrashed and kicked, digging his sharp nails into Icos's arms and tearing at them. "Shit!" Icos hissed as he nearly dropped him. "Tanya, help out here please!" 

[Zahkriit Arquebust]

"Heartless bastards, recruiting children..." Zahkriit said has he did his best to shoot at those adults who were fighting against them. He pondered for a bit about how maybe some of these adults were in the same boat as the children, as this was their only way to work. But he didn't ponder it for long, and kept returning fire.
"How are you doing on Ammo, agent?" He shouted to Natalia, making sure she was well stocked on ammo.

[Tanya O'Douette]

Tanya was just about getting down to the last couple she'd run into when she heard Icos call to her. Shifting a gaze quickly from him to the last box before her, she aimed and fired off the last lock and as she turned to find where he was she heard the commotion. Where she was at first expecting to see more Collectors to fight around her eyes widened as she saw Icos struggling to hang onto the bundle of a little man in his arms, even smaller yet than she'd remembered him but there was no mistaken his identity even in his rough state.

"Hoch!"

She'd realize how terrible it was afterward that she left anyone else who was still alive in said boxes behind as she ran back to Icos, tucking away her revolvers right away. Even forgetting who she was even with for a moment she gave reached in on Icos forcefully, trying to pull the Dwarv Minor from his arms.

"I'll take him! Hoch, c-come on, it's okay. We're getting you out!" her voice struggled quite a bit to try to sound soothing in a time where the room was going up in flames and panic was still high, but she tried her best all the same. He needed out and he needed medical help, that was all that mattered.

[Hoch Kreatur]

Hoch thought he was dead. In fact he was sure of it. While he expected the voice of the passed Imperial family to call out to him and guide him to the afterlife he was rather confused when the face of his god looked like Icos and the voice belonged to Tanya Flynn. That was a good indication that he wasn't in fact dead.

His wide eyes suddenly shifted on Tanya, his hands falling weak as he struggled to voice his thoughts, "T-Tanya?" He asked through a highly dehydrated voice. "Please by the young Empress's will let this not be a dream." He begged as his body fell weak, all of his strength lost to that wild attack he thrown on Icos.

Who, by the way, was hissing at the open wound on his arm that was leaking a great dealing of blood. He wrapped it tightly with cloth and turned to start opening the rest of the cases. Upon finishing them he turned back to the two. "We need to move." He said in a simple, smooth and very calm voice. Honestly the entire building was being engulfed in flames yet he was pretty cool about it.

[Tanya O'Douette]

He like all the others that were trapped smelled horrible, sounded just as bad, and looked the part as well but even then she took the moment--while Icos broke free the last of them--to cradle Hoch in her arms.

"Not a dream," she whispered close to his ear, glancing to the doorway they'd previously come in to make sure it was still safe for at least their exit, "just hang on a little more, I'm going to get you out safe."

As Icos had come back to them she felt as though his words, calmer than she'd heard all night, were actually more terrifying than when he'd been yelling out commands instead. Regardless, they'd fought in, the found what she was looking for, they had to get out before they could call anything a success for the night. With a brief nod she turned on her heel and didn't need to be told twice as she tore off back to the stairs, her friend wrapped up in her arms.

[Icos El-Elron]

With Tanya ahead, Icos close behind and the group of prisoners behind them they traveled their way down the stairs. All was going well until they reached the second floor and the door to the hall flew open with the last of the Collectors running out, they were a rather large group of them as well, perhaps close to a dozen of them and they recognized their prisoners when they saw them.

"What the hell?" The lead one questioned, halting the entire group who looked very anxious to get out. "They weren't supposed to get free!"

Icos moved ahead quickly, putting himself between Tanya and the Collector he looked him in the eye and spoke very clearly, "You can die now or have a chance outrunning our bullets. Which would you like to pick?" He was hoping that the fire growing on the second floor was enough to put the right amount of pressure on them.

The man only took a couple of minutes to decide and the fool tried to draw his gun in these tight quarters. Icos grabbed the hand that reached for the gun and swiped his knife along his neck before tossing the dead body over the side of the stairs, with enough room between Icos and the group two more charged at him, each meeting similar fates as the one. The rest of the Collectors stared wide eyed at Icos and each one looked like they wanted to run like hell.

"Fuck off." Icos hissed as he brought his gun up towards the group. A moment later they began to stream away down the stairs and another thirty seconds later the stairs were clear. He glanced back to the group and gave a solid nod, "Let's move."

They continued their path all the way until they had reached the door they had came through, "Alright, everyone. As soon as we get out of the building you need to get down to the ground so my people don't start shooting at you, alright?!" Icos commanded the prisoners, counting that the IIA Agents would at least recognize Icos and Tanya.

[Tanya O'Douette]

Tanya froze at the sight of the last large handful of Collectors coming by, clutching Hoch closer to her and turning her back to them protectively when they made mention of the prisoners escaping when they apparently shouldn't be. She could only cough away as the building grew steadily thicker with smoke, her revolvers tucked away and only saw out of the corner of her eyes as Icos forcefully convinced the group to stand down. By this point she could care less how they died, it was weird to say.

As they approached the final door at last Tanya stood ready, looking over the prisoners with them that were just so lucky to be able to even see outside of their cruel set-up. She hoped they could get them out of here safely, though she personally wasn't willing to set Hoch to the ground. She'd get on her knees and crawl out with him if she had to, if it came to that but she was more content on carrying him out herself.

[Icos El-Elron]

Icos pushed the door to the compound open and was suddenly greeted with the sudden overwhelming smell of cold, fresh air that flushed into his smoke filled lungs. The cold air was actually too much for Icos to suddenly handle and he stumbled to the ground upon exiting the building, cough very violently. Standing in front of them were a group of IIA agents who had their weapons trained on the group of people exiting, even as they dropped to the floor as Icos had told them to do.

"They're good, they're good!" Icos explained between coughs, "Put your weapons down!" The IIA Agents slowly lowered their weapons on demand of Icos.  It was rather weird, aside from a few shots made at the retreating Collectors the entire street was shockingly silent, aside from the many burning buildings that created a roaring sound in the background Icos was sure they had finally taken the compound and eliminated the enemy.

Natalia and Zahkriit had already retreated down from the burning compound and were back on the ground. She had been dragging dead or wounded IIA Agents out to the trucks they had when Icos suddenly appeared. She adjusted the rifle that hung on her back and walked up to the group before kneeling to Icos and putting a hand on his shoulder, "You okay?"

"No."

"Did you kill their leader."

"Not that I know of."

"Did we win?"

"Yes."

"Excellent!" Natalia said with a pat on his back as she stood back up. "Don't take too long. We're already keeping the police busy with road blocks and such, we won't have much long time so let's collect our people and get the hell out."

As Natalia and Icos spoke, Hoch looked wide eyed up at Tanya as he was entirely unsure that this was still real. Yet in the back of his mind he wanted to ask, needed to ask one simple thing. "Where's Morgan, Tanya?" He asked, a fear in the pit of his stomach that he had been killed by the Dust Collection Agency.

[Tanya O'Douette]

Tanya walked past everyone once it was clear, slowly her feet came to a dragging pace and with the greatest sigh of relief she thought she'd ever had in her life she let herself sink slowly to the ground with Hoch. She hugged him close, pulling away as he spoke. Looking down at him his question made her pause, giving her a 'baby deer in the headlights' kind of look about her.

'That's right, Tanya. Just where is Morgan? Arguing with Currie how to best exact revenge on Dust, regathering their men, dragging your family into more danger, that's more like it. Not a single thought has been put to Hoch, I'm sure...'

Out of the corner of her eye she saw the pink and black-coloured outfit of Callie from a good ten feet away approaching, Tanya having an idea of what she would answer with. 'Morgan's just fine, he's already gone ahead to drop the rest of his friends and family in the fire.' Something like that. She knew she sat too long to answer the Dwarv Minor's question but when she did she smiled a smile filled with only the warmth and love that a dear family member could, her eyes filling with tears for reasons that mixed guilt, anger for her father, and the joy she felt for having him with her safe at last.

"He and the family are hiding out with Currie. We're fine, but we all worried so much about you," she said quietly and brushed her fingers gently through his hair, "Daddy sent me to find you and bring you home while he sorted things out. He'll be happy to hear this."

She remembered once being called out by Hoch on her bad lying. She would have to wait and see if she'd gotten better at it by now.

[Hoch Kreatur]

Hoch merely watched in silence as Tanya spoke, perhaps she had gotten better at lying or Hoch was just to weak feeling to give a shit but he bought the words she spoke. He closed his eyes, relieved at the fact Morgan was alive, hell he was even glad Dust didn't get Currie. "I'm glad they're okay..." Hoch said with a light cough to follow. 

Icos grabbed a wounded IIA Agent and picked him up, "Soldier through it." Icos merely said as his whined from the sudden movement. They didn't have time to wait and patch him up here, they would have to do it once they got clear from the place. A line of IIA Agents quickly made their way down the street and piled the wounded and dead into two separate vans before entering into a third. The response time from the police had been so slowed due to the massive attacks that were happening around the city, part of the idea of attacking at the same time was to slow the response time just as much as it was to keep Dust from packing up and leaving.

Hoch watched with wide eyes as they crossed past the destruction - burning buildings, bullet ridden cars and blood soaked streets. He couldn't believe Tanya was part of this, this was war that occurred on the streets and the fact that the sweet girl he knew was part of all of THIS really struck him.  His eyes briefly glanced towards Icos, who's face showed little emotion as they piled into the van. 

The van door closed and Icos sat with his back hunched over and eyes staring straight ahead. Occasionally he would raise his hand and wipe off some specs of blood but mostly he sat in complete silence. He, like everyone else, needed time to process what had happened. 

[Tanya O'Douette]

Tanya was too relieved to be reunited with her tiny crew. Callie was quick to come help Tanya with moving Hoch and as Tanya's eyes fell on Troy she bit her lip, noticing his wounded hand just as he tried to hide it on her behind his back with a sheepish grin. Happy to have them back safely, they got themselves ready to leave with the others in the vehicles. The whole way they said very little, save for when Callie leaned in beside Tanya and whispered, "What are you going to tell your dad?"

"I don't know. I'll figure it out when we get there," Tanya whispered as well, leaning in to sit cheek-to-cheek with Callie.

"Does your friend uh...know?"

"No."

Callie pulled away a moment to narrow her eyes at Tanya then, disappointed in her answer of course but it wasn't something Tanya wanted to get into at the moment. Her eyes looked over her to Icos, studying the man carefully as she considered the situation in full, from beginning to end and felt that she really was lucky that he decided to help her even when he didn't have to. He didn't have to but he did regardless of what kind of trouble it put him through.

She bit her lip. Sitting around shoulder-to-shoulder with everyone wasn't the time to confront him, she would have to catch him after.

[Icos El-Elron]

The car ride back was in complete silence as everybody absorbed what had just occurred. Nobody even bothered to blindfold Flynn's group, perhaps because everybody was dazed by the fighting and couldn't remember to blindfold their allies or simply that there was a level of acceptance between them all. It took a bit longer then normal to get back as the driver took painstaking measures to avoid the scrambling security forces.

The drive took nearly half an hour before they arrived at their little base of operations that sat in a parking garage. By the time they got back to it the IIA was already packing up everything to be moved again, as it was concluded by those above Icos that from this massive attack they needed to move and move operations further into the city to remain hidden from those who wished to do them harm.

The van stopped and the injured were immediately unloaded to be taken care of by the doctors they had on staff. Icos busied himself getting the wounded out first, not saying any words aside from brief sentences of support for those who were injured. With all of them unloaded Icos retreated away from the group to the back of the parking garage where remainders of a small changing center stood. Behind some tattered curtains he began to strip off his clothes that were so soaked in blood that it left little droplets of sticky wet blood upon his skin. Icos had heard many stories about Ellusian warriors before him, so soaked in the blood of their enemy that when washed they would leave behind a thick pool of blood.  Icos bowed to his knees and took a white towel and began to run it along his skin, collecting all the blood that had stuck to his skin, by the time he had finished the once clean white towel was covered in the thick red substance.  

He slipped on a simple white shirt and blue pants, something easy that when he sought to vanish into the crowd it would be easy. He pulled the curtain back and rejoined the group who was working to get the hell out of here as quickly as possible.

His gaze turned to Tanya and her gang and gave a brief nod, "You should probably get going, your car has been parked over with the rest of ours." He had no intentions of holding a conversation, he was simply ready to get out.

[Tanya O'Douette]

This was probably the only time she really had if she was going to do it, feeling tired and kind of sick from all the 'excitement' Tanya threw all formalities and worries out the window as they all made to move the moment they pulled up. She shooed Callie away with Troy and Hoch when Icos addressed them, turning back to see him already going to move and she sprang into motion after him.

"H-hey wait!" she called after him. Even if she had to march along with him, she had at least something she felt was important to say.

"I-I'm sorry for all the trouble I've caused, you know. This was...big...a-and I don't feel like I might have contributed a lot to it..." she sucked in a quick breath and then smiled something genuine though, something so full of relief that she honestly felt as though she were happy for the first time in what felt like years.

"Thank you for this! You didn't have to help me at all, no one else was going to, b-but you did. And if there's anything I can help you out with in the future, I'd be more than happy to help in any way I can," she spat out finally. She wasn't sure how much help she could ever be to someone like Icos El-Elron, but she had connections anyway. That was something?


The girl wasn't sure what exactly he might have thought of her, maybe she was annoying. Searching for one guy he didn't know and probably didn't care about might have seemed trivial, perhaps even unrewarding. Everything works as a ripple effect, however. Whether Icos knew it or not, his actions towards the young lady shaped the future as his act of kindness (whether he intended it that way or not) was something she would never forget.