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While Bast was trying to comfort Lyger, the explosion that War-Pulse had created rattled the room.  When the small shards of glass began to shower the floor, Bast clung close to Lyger, trying to shield both herself and Lyger from the broken glass.  Not long after the first shock wave, a second one, created by the SIlver Sorceress, went off.  However, since Lyger was already affected by the Silver Sorceress’ spell and Bast was protected by the Moly herb, this shock wave did not affect the two metahumans.

“I’ll be right back, Lyger.”  Bast tried to reassure him, even though she was not sure whether he could even hear her, “I just need to see if everyone else is okay.”

She stepped away from Lyger and went around the corner to where the rest of the action had been happening.  When she saw the aftermath of both War-Pulse’ explosion and the Silver Sorceress’ spell, Bast placed both hands over her mouth in shock of what she saw.  It almost looked as if a bomb had gone off in the middle of the room: broken glass, equipment thrown around, and a scorched floor where the epicenter was.  The only good news, if it could even been called that, was that all the heroes were still alive, although in a state similar to Lyger’s.

“Guys, we have a problem,” Sammy said as she activated the earpiece that Chris had supplied to all the heroes involved in this operation.  “Whatever the Silver Sorceress did, it incapacitated everyone on Team One.”

Bast continued to walk around the room to see what else had happened.  “The Silver Sorceress and the plant girl seem to be out cold, too, although War-Pulse and the evil spider lady are MIA.”

[color=C0C0C0]“Thunderbolt should be bringing Radiance and the White Witch back soon.  Sit tight until they arrive.[/color] Chris responded from the Sherman Center back in Lost Haven.

This, however, would be easier said than done.  Right after she had finished speaking with Chris, Bast thought she had heard something moving behind her.  When she turned around, Bast didn’t find anyone there.  She exhaled a deep sigh, hoping that she was just hearing things, in spite of weird things she had already witnessed here.

But when she turned the corner to return to where Lyger was, Bast discovered that she was not just hearing things.  Before her stood a giant of a man.  If someone was not astonished by the man’s height, he would have been by his lionlike appearance.  In his monstrous claws, this lion-man, Leo, held Lyger off the ground by the neck.  His lion head growled at the incapacitated Lyger.

“Why don’t you pick on someone your own size?”  Bast blurred out without thinking about the consequence.  Leo, in response to Bast’s demand, if anyone could actually call it that, turned to look towards the young catgirl.  He released Lyger from his grasp, letting him to fall to the floor.   Then, he took a few steps towards Bast, who also backed up in response.

“Oh, I didn’t mean [b]me[/b]!  I’m smaller than Lyger over there.  Maybe we should wait until someone else, like Icon, comes back.”  

While Leo was approaching, Bast was frozen in place, paralyzed by both the guilt of leaving Lyger behind with this man-lion and the fright of the large metahuman in general.  By the time she was able to muster the strength and courage to turn and run, Leo was barely within arms reach, which allowed him to grab hold of her tail and yank her back.

Bast was held off the ground by Leo in a similar way as he had done to Lyger, except that he pressed the young woman up against the wall.  She tried to squirm her way out of the man’s clutches.  While she flailed, Bast’s own feline claws scratched Leo’s face.  As a result, she fell to the ground while the man-lion roared in pain.

However, as she caught her breath, Bast realized that all she did was infuriate Leo ever more than he already had been.  Although she was able to roll out of the way of a punch that was aimed for her back, she felt his heavy foot slam down on her.  Before she knew it, Bast felt herself collide with the wall after she had been thrown into it.  When she tried to pull herself up off the ground, Bast was struck on the back by Leo.

“Lyger!”  Bast called out to the nearby metahuman, hoping that he would snap out of the spell that has so far incapacitated him.

“Hold me Kyle, I’m so cold.” Sam said weakly, her voice hoarse as she struggled to speak. Every instant that passed, the color drained from her face, her eyes grew dull. 

“I’m here Sam, I’m not going to leave you. You’re going to be alright, you have to be alright.” Lyger told her as he cradled her limp body. Her breathing was weakening, her heart was slowing. She was slipping away. A rage began to burn within him as he came to a heart-wrenching realization. He was going to lose her. 

Sam was going to die, and there was nothing that he could do about it.

“Kyle…” Sam said as she took her last breath. As her body relaxed in his arms, her flesh became ashen and began to flake. At first it was slow, but then, with a sudden gust of wind Sam was gone, her body blowing away in the wind. 

Kyle just kneeled there, his arms fixed as if they were still holding her, yet he was completely overcome with grief. 

How did this happen? 
“Lyger!”

 He heard a voice calling to him through the darkness, begging him to come back, and suddenly it was as if he had awoken from a terrible nightmare. He found himself back in the warehouse in West Virginia, and he knew instantly what had happened. The Silver Sorceress had somehow gotten into his head and made him live out his worst fears. 

He felt utterly violated by what she had done to him, and he was pissed. However, when he saw what was going on around him, he knew that payback would have to wait. The entire team was down, in fact, everyone was, minus several combatants who were currently MIA. Then he saw what, or who, had pulled him from his nightmare. 

His rage was refocused onto a large meta that he had not seen before, and that he didn’t recognize from Arthur’s briefing. This “man” was larger than most of the others, and appeared to be a human/lion hybrid. 

And he had been absolutely brutalizing Bast. He had been slamming her head first into the wall, while pounding her with punishing punches and kicks. Lyger could see that she was bleeding from her nose and mouth, as well as a gash on her forehead. 

“Why don’t you try that with me?” Lyger said as he launched himself at the large meta, driving his foot into his back.

Leo had to brace his hands against the wall in order to keep his balance after Lyger’s kick connected with the lion-man’s back.  Turning to face the previously incapacitated hero, Leo snarled as he sized up Lyger.  While Lyger was taller than the average person, Leo still looked down upon the hero.

Before Leo could retaliate against Lyger, Bast yanked on Leo’s tail.  When Leo turned his back on the young metahuman, he had thought that she was out for the count.  However, her action surprised him, which caused him to momentarily pause.  This short hesitation gave Lyger an opening for another attack.

The massive Man-Lion snarled as he turned his attention again to Bast, the momentary distraction gave Lyger the chance to pounce. He dove toward the cat man, delivering a hard right hand to the side of his head.

“I said, ‘try that with me.’ Leave the lady alone.” Lyger said as he delivered another hard punch to Leo’s head as the Man-Lion spun to face the hero. Lyger ducked a wild swing from his larger opponent and landed several body shots hoping to knock the wind out of the man beast. Lyger dodged and countered Leo’s attacks, culminating with a hard shot to the Man-Lion’s jaw, which only further enraged the beast. 

Lyger moved in on Leo, perhaps getting slightly overconfident as he easily avoided the larger meta’s attacks while landing his own. However, Leo swung at Lyger, hitting him with a wild backhand that sent the hero flying through the air, landing in a heap several feet away. He was momentarily stunned, but quickly got his wits about him and got back to his feet, just in time to sidestep a leaping Leo. 

As Leo landed just feet from Lyger, he stepped behind him, connecting with a kick to the back of the Lion-Man’s knee. Leo cried out as he began to go to the ground, but Lyger did not relent. As Leo was on his way to the ground, Lyger followed up with an elbow to the face, as he straddled the prone cat man, and landed several hard punches to the face, then an open hand strike to the chin, before finishing him off with a headbutt to the bridge of the nose. 

When Leo no longer struggled, Lyger climbed off of the larger man and made his way over to Bast, who was barely able to stand. He knelt down beside her and put a hand on her shoulder. 

“Are you hurt?” He asked, not needing her to answer to see that she was. She had a nasty gash on her forehead and another on her cheek, and she was also bleeding from her nose and mouth. As he saw the condition of the young woman, anger again washed over him, this time the anger was directed at Arthur. Bast was smart and resourceful, and she had done well, but she hadn’t been ready for something like this. Indeed, he and Arthur would have words, but now wasn’t the time. The time for that would come later, once this ordeal was over.

“You did good.” Lyger said, his voice softening slightly as he helped her to her feet.

Bast’s legs felt like rubber as she was helped up to her feet by Lyger.  She clung close to Lyger, resting her head against his shoulder.  She wanted to ask him how he was doing.  Although she had no idea what Lyger had experienced while under the Silver Sorceress’ spell, Bast could guess that it was not pleasant, especially since she already knew what the Silver Sorceress could do.  She wanted to ask who this ‘Sam’ was that he was muttering his is bewitched state.  However, she felt too weak to ask.  All she could do was hold onto the man who saved her.