Carnage

Down on the Promenade, Gerbil gazed around in mute astonishment as the dead flickered in and out of existence around him. He'd had no idea that this sort of thing was even possible.

A nearby alien trooper wheeled amid the chaos, levelled his blaster at the guy Gerbil had just been talking to about 'knobby parents' and pulled the trigger before he could even shout a warning.

The shot was absorbed by a dark haired apparition of a woman who warped into the space between them and pounced forward onto the trooper, tearing off one of his arms and flinging it away before gouging out his throat.

In all, the trooper's messy death took just less that five seconds, leaving a shocked Yeldarb no time to even say thanks before the woman had dissipated and moved on to her next kill.

“That...” Gerbil began “Oh, dear”

Trailing green blood, the severed arm had sailed through the air and collided, wetly, with the back of a short woman with auburn hair.

“What the?” she turned round, her grey eyes flashing angrily.

“Are you okay?” Gerbil hurried forwards, his feet slipping slightly in the green blood, puddling on the floor.

“Where on earth did that come from?” the woman demanded.

“That dead trooper” Yeldarb indicated the bloody corpse, still twitching on the floor, as he approached.

“Don't worry – He's 'armless” Gerbil smiled, hoping that a little weak humour would diffuse the situation.

The woman just scowled at him “You're a hard-light hologram, right?”

“Yeah...”

“Good. I'm Doctor Jade Black. There are causalities here that need my attention, but first I need a first aid kit and some guaranteed protection while I work. You two are going to provide that for me – Any questions?”

Ideally, Jade would have liked to make sure that her friends were okay, but they'd come through worse scrapes than this; and in any case, her duty as a doctor came first.

“Uh, yeah...” Yeldarb cleared his throat and pointed behind Jade “What are we going to do about that?”

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What is “that” and what are you going to do about it?
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