Francis woke up. That was good, he guessed. He waited a few moments, listening outside for anything, the sounds of birds, wind, the people outside of the mosque. Oddly, it was quiet outside. He payed it no mind, opening his eyes and propping himself up against the wall. He rubbed his face with his hands, feeling the stubble and reminding himself to shave soon. Vendel snored softly beside him, curled in the corner about his sword. Wiping the sleep from his eyes and getting to his sore legs, the need to relieve himself grew. He looked about the room, seeing Qara'sion, Elayna, Zainat. Blade had not wandered in and he caught himself looking for Gorzath before he remembered the news. [i]Gods-damned shame.[/i] He shook his head. He sniffed and cleared his throat, stepping around a few bodies to get to the door of the place. Moving aside one of the slabs of wood, he stepped outside, closing his eyes and shielding them from the morning sun. Undoing his pants, he wet the wall and sighed. He didn't want to think about the past day's events before feeling something poke against the back of his head.

He re-did his pants, an eternity of silence ensued as he stood there. If he was going to die, he'd be dead already, so whatever was against the back of his head must be leverage. The problem with that being after dying twice already, he cared a fleck of stray piss about leverage. He slowly turned around, greeted by the pale gray face of a dwemer and one of his friends. Behind him, there looked to be a full team, complete with one of the giant crabs. He gritted his teeth.

"By the authority of the Dwemer High Government, you are being arrested for insighting insurrection, destruction of property, aiding enemies of the sta-" Francis ducked to the side, putting all of his weight into shoulder-checking one of the dwemer and running back inside, throwing himself to the ground as the cracks of dwemer weaponry resounded outside. He got to one knee and shouted for the others to wake up before a section of the wall blew away with a deafening explosion that staggered Francis. 

The chaos that followed shook the Mosque to its foundations and the blast detonated a hole in the East wall the size of a large table, jetting cracks snaked out from the now gaping hole and the early morning sunlight began to pour in, as if aiding in the fury. Plaster and dust crumbled from the ceiling as the foundation took a beating, and those inside were needless to say rudely awoken.

One of the rebel leaders in the Mosque, a woman named Leah, a Breton-Redguard mix, hurried to get the late-wakers to their feet. "Come on! They're going to bring the roof down on top of us!" she urged, hurrying to a window to take stock of the scene outside. How in Oblivion had the dwemer discovered the Mosque, she wondered, and mustered enough forces to flatten it? She could see dozens of heavily armoured soldiers, a quarter of whom were in the dreaded powered armour, and several stern, perhaps hateful faces gazed upon the centuries old structure as if willing it to die, consuming its occupents in its death throes. What had happened? She looked around, noticing Francis was missing, cursing. She called out his name. 

Francis heard his name being called as he got to his feet. Vendel awoke in the corner and Francis waved him over before looking for whoever called his name. Seeing a stray blade sticking up out of the ruined wall's tumbled parts, he took the hilt in hand and returned to his search for the one who called his name. He looked around, seeing a woman who didn't quite look as Redguard as most he'd seen waving to him. He ran to her, "What is it?"

"Oh, I don't know, it couldn't be that there's a dwemer garrison standing outside bombarding us while you were nowhere to be seen. You look unhurt, which is fortunate." Leah said bitingly, looking out the window again, noticing that soul gems were being affixed to pedestals outside and several rifles were being leveled at the windows. "You must know that we cannot withstand the assault, we'll all be killed. You need to gather the others and get to the hidden passage beneath the floor; I know not where it leads to, but it was made years ago by the old Imams ((I'll have to check this to see if it's spelled correctly)) in case invaders like the Akaviiri or even the mer came down upon Hegathe and sacked it. They must know of you and the others, the so-called Heroes. You are an image they wish to have erased. You must know this city is no longer safe for your faces."

Francis sneered at her biting attitude. Only the first few seconds of them knowing each other and she was already snapping at him. Usually it would take until the morning after and they'd be asking about the lack of pay when he tried to sneak away. Francis shook his head at her piece about not being welcome here, "I learned that the first few days in this city, miss. I have no want of being erased either. You can count on me."

With that, he sprang into action. He wasn't quite sure how he would rally the men and women and absolutely no idea where the secret passage was, which he reckoned was the point of it anyway. Thankfully, one of the older insurgents opened it and was waving his boys through before flinching in pain after some of the cracks outside and fell through the hole. The men continued funneling into it, but the dwemer were rapidly advancing. Francis was filled with no small amount of fright, knowing that there were no fancy healers to fix sucking chest wounds or cut arteries. He could die here, forever this time. More of the insurgents fell after the dwemer rose their staves and he felt angry. Angry at them for not saving themselves and trying to fight, but he knew and reminded himself why after a moment's thinking. They did it for the ones hopping down the trapdoor next to him. He remembered the Mausoleum, what he did, or more accurately didn't and failed to do. He remembered it all, from the yesterday's riots to the Wayrest alley, the knife dripping blood and the body laying before him. Crumpled about its wounds.

He thought of Gorzath, pushed the image of Blade's cadaver from his mind, hoped he didn't hear Elayna's death screams among the battle's ruckus. He stood, white-knuckle gripping the hilt of the redguard scimitar and stepped forward before a big hand clamped itself around his shoulder. He looked to see it was Vendel. The two shared a moment of understanding and he knew what he saw in Vendel's eyes, the same thing that was in his. The loyalty to a brother. He wouldn't let him be the one to do the saving this time. He owed it to everyone on the Isle of N'Gasta. "Get in the fucking hole, Vendel."

Vendel simply shook his head, "Rally them, I'll see you again."

With that, he pushed Francis away, stumbling to his arse and bounded away with the insurgents, beyond Francis's view, beyond the wall. Cracks resounded, more insurgents fell, but he knew his task. He saw movement in one of the insurgents hit from one of the attacks from the dwemer staves and rushed to him, hooking his arms under the insurgent's armpits and dragging him towards the hole and handing him off to another insurgent. He saw some of the others, Zainat, Elayna, Qara'sion, and he waved them over, hoping for them to get to him and hoping ten-fold they wouldn't drop trying to get to him and the passageway.

The onslaught was finally reaching the apex of it's fury as the rifles thundred in a rolling volley and the crab automata continued its lethal barrage against the foundations of the Mosque, each blast removing precious cover from those taking refuge inside and obliterating years of history in the process. While most of the casualties weren't caused by the ballista itself, several of the insurgents were pelted by collapsing rubble with various degrees of lethality. When the Mosque doors caved inward from the force of a blast, the Captain signaled for the crab to cease fire and gestured to the first of the vanguard to make their assault. "Lieutenant, how fares the search for the tunnels?"

"My team is searching dilligently, sir. So far, nothing has been observed. The city has changed much since the maps and tomes were drawn and written. We suspect some of the entrances might have been built over."

"Continue the seach. If these rats find their way back into their nests, we may lose them. Let us hope it won't be necessary. Take what men you need, we should be done here shortly." the Captain said, turning back to the doors and impassively watching as the first of the hulking suits of armour made their way into the passage beyond to hunt down their quarry.