A Good Day to....

<Snip>
One of the cargo cranes high overhead suddenly rumbled into life, the massive lifting hook descending with a high pitched whine to tear through one of the overhead gantries
“There’s our cue” Jamie yelled as the Core suddenly erupted into gunfire, directed up at the crane as the hook dragged across the top of a cargo container, scattering a posse of escapees who were in turn picked off by the other combatants
</Snip>

The group scuttled through the wreckage of the crushed crates and slowly mad their way across the large room. Every now and then one of them would have to flatten to the floor as an inmate fired off a round of gunfire in their direction, someone having moved too slowly, or stood up in the wrong place presenting a target.

The dwarfers were near the entrance to the control room after what felt like a great deal of running, dodging and sneaking. Jade hung back, making sure that the others were safely into the small hut at the top of the stairs. Only when after everyone else had gone, and Jaxx was left did they realise the problem. The suddenly seeming very large gap to the stairs was now feeling a great deal bigger.

"Yo, Doc I don't think I can do stairs like." Jaxx wheezed.

"Well you can't stay here. You'll get blown apart." Jade hissed. As if to punctuate the matter, a hail of heavy plasma fire flew overhead and incinerated the nearby packing crates.

"Like. But. I can't go up stairs. I'm just a Scutter man." Jaxx said simply. "I'll hold here, provide cover fire so that Eve is most righteously safe in the glass box."

"Stupid idea." Jade breathed, hefting the Scutter by the claw and dragging it towards the stairs as best she could. Now a normal Scutter would have been no problem to carry properly, but with the arms, scanners, chains and all the extra modifications made to him Jaxx was too heavy to do anything but manhandle up the stairs.

A burst of gunfire sang out through the core, slicing the handle of Jade's medical bag and sending it skittering to the floor below and causing Jade to wince. She managed to get Jaxx to the top and hurtled foolishly down again to get the bag.

As she began to gather the spilled contents together and into the bag another hail of gunfire erupted, the super heated plasma obliterating the contents that had spilled and remained uncollected. Jade made it to the control room, breathing heavily, clutching her abdomen out of breath.

"That was a stupid thing to go back for." Jacky pointed out.

"I thought we might need it yet." Jade said, wincing.

"Well as long as we have the nanites. It's ok, we can get Jaxx back into his real body" Eve said, a smile on her face as she clung feverishly to the metal body.

"Yeah... Only managed to get one back." Jade said "We need to hurry up... It's getting bad out there. Where's the time drive Jamie?" Jade asked, addressing the engineer who was closest to what looked like a control pad.

"You ok?" He asked, a quizzical look on his face, as he looked over the pale doctor.

"Yeah. Fine." Jade said. "Can we hurry up?"

She drifted to the back of the group as they all poured over the displays looking for the Time Drive. When no one was looking, she lifted her hand away from her midsection. A growing pool of blood oozed out through her fingers. Looking through the medical bag revealed that most of the useful things had been lost to the plasma fire. No anti-coagulant, no pain killers, no clotting agent, no antiseptic.

Well this is going to put a crimp in my day. She thought as the pain began to grow in intensity.

She clamped her hand back over the hole, a wad of bandage clasped over it to try and stem the flow.

Now was not a good time for this. I need to keep everyone together. I need to be strong so that we can get out of here. She steeled herself against the injury and hoped that no one would notice. The last thing they needed now was any more delays.

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