[color=lightgray][indent]She dreamed of blood and fire. The raging inferno lighting up the abyss around her. The smoke filling her lungs with ashen remnants and obscuring her vision. She stumbled and fell hands sinking deep into the lifeless bodies below her. Her countrymen, the people that she was supposed to be protect. Dead splayed out like animals to the slaughter. Those that lived clinged to what little life they could calling out to her, moaning and writhing in pain.  As she attempted to push herself up a hand wrenched itself from the crush and grabbed at her, burning skin at the touch. 

Another hand rose and another and another. Ripping and tearing at her pulling her into the pile of corpses. She tried to fight back but for every limb she managed to pull away it seemed like four others had rushed up in its place. She watched as the hole that she was dragged through slowly began to fill in bodies casting her in darkness. And then there was nothing.

Her vision came to distorted and warped. Her left eye throbbing swollen shut from having smashed into the shuttle console. Pilot’s chair had ripped from its bearings with her still strapped into the seat. It was thrown backwards somewhere in the middle of the shuttle on the ceiling which had somehow along the way become the floor. The last impact had jettisoned her from her bindings having sent her sprawled across the floor. Her ears still rang and she felt her stomach lurch as whatever contents sat in her stomach had been forcibly expelled into a rather pitiful puddle. Scrunching her face in disgust her hand sliding across slick metal walls somehow managed to find enough purchase to pull herself into a sitting position. Stabbing dagger-like pain  almost immediate as she tried to put pressure on her right leg. If she hadn’t already vomited from the constant titling of the world around her, she would've vomited from the sight.  Tibia fractured and jutting outwards a few centimeters below the knee cap. 

She tried to remember what happened but it was hazy. The memories of the attack all fading into her. Ardin... Ardin had told her to run, to release the holdings and get out. The assailant that had come after them having pushed him into a corner. The attacking ship had fired upon the shuttle as soon as it  hit the open air. One of the engines blew and all she could do was try and pitch the nose upward enough so that the cockpit wasn’t crushed instantly upon impact. Which had lead her to this moment. The killers were still out there and she was next. 

No. She wouldn't die here. She was Colette Van Skymning, of House Skymning. She had a lineage tracing back hundreds of years. Her ancestors had conquered kingdoms and defied the Spirits themselves and lived to tell the tale. She was not going to die scared and alone in the wreck of a shuttle. She couldn'tl. Or at least that’s what she told herself even as her hands shook and the tears flowed freely from her eyes. She took a deep breath and then another.

[i]One step at a time.[/i] She pressed her hand against the broken leg. She then began to channel the Mist. Her  heart pounded inside of her chest one wrong move, one loss of concentration and she could empty in too much Mist into her body and induce Mist Burn, too little and all would be for nought. She bit  down hard on her free arm in preparation and began to push with the Mist. She could feel as the energy was forced into her bone and very slowly inch by inch the protruding flash of white was slowly forced back into the body. She bit down harder into arm feeling the cooper taste of her own blood fill her mouth. Finally after what seemed like an entirely she let it go. The bone was back in place, the pain was still there and enough would easily snap it again but if she was careful she would be okay.

It was then that  she heard the footsteps. Heavy and cumbersome things crunching across scorched earth. Her mind instantly flashed back to the robots that had assaulted her ship. She quickly conjured up her bow with an arrow already being drawn. A large blade slammed through the busted door. She flinched backwards but managed to remain quiet as it was torn from its hinges. She kept the bow level waitin and waiting. The door was pulled away and backlit by the fires that raged behind him was a.... Man? She hesitated for a second  and when the arrow was released it wavered from the heart and smashed into the shoulder. The man said something that fell on deaf instantly Colette released another arrow. This one was easily deflected away by the man’s massive sword. She could hear others approaching she yelled out a warning. 

Another voice yelled out. What was it.... Grenade?! A small spherical object came soaring through the sky and landed easily inside the twisted hull. Colette reacted instantly Ardin’s training kick in hard and fast. The bow vanished and her hand flicked out and instantly a small glowing barrier appeared around the ‘grenade.’  

The WARDENs would of noticed something at this point. An oddity that only those as highly attuned to the Mists as them would detect. For rather than the expected result of magic being used, a lessing of the Mist in the air around them as the user draw in power something else happened. The already heavy background Mist layer that surrounded them flamed up almost as if they were fueled by the girls casting. The ship above reacting to the display letting out a low groan that made the ground shake. The light from the barrier was like a torch in the abbys cutting a slice of light in the darkness. 

Rather than seeing the enemy that they all envisioned they saw something else. [url=https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/66/b8/e5/66b8e5b327239e1c2bcdf726a34defa0.jpg] A girl maybe their age or a little bit younger.[/url] Distinctively not from around their neck of the woods in both appearance and facial structure - the hair ink black tucked into a braid too dark and the skin a warmer palette than that seen in the mountainous lands. She looked like the enemy. She looked from them down towards the ‘grenade’ now illuminated by the light of the barrier.  

“A rock?” She asked surprised. “Did you just throw a rock?!”

Setzer having wrestled Gideon off of him at this point standing back up with his sword at the ready took a step forward calling outward as he did. “Trust me lady  wasn’t my idea.”

As he moved closer the girl rose her hand upward into the air, the mist flared again angrily. The arcane energy dancing and sparking off her like a live wire. Gallahad would feel the energy of his ‘flash bang’ being drawn into the angry around her like a magnetic pull. The center of her palm beginning to glow with a light the increased. [b]“Step. Back.”[/b]

Setzer despite himself managed to halt his movement. His sword was still raised ready to charge in at a moment's notice but he called out to her. “Woah. Woah. As much as I would like to give you a thrashing with my sword here, me and my friends need some answers.”  

“Answers?” 

“Yeah, you know the talkin’ type.”

“Like what?” The mist still charging around her lashing outwards in small sparks of energy that bounced off of Setzer’s blade. 

“Well who you are would be a good start don’tcha think?”

“You first.” Colette responded voice firm. 

“Well on account of the war going on and you crashing your airship filled with Vangar soldiers here how about no.” 

“I was invited here. By your King of all people. And within hours of entering your airspace, a trap is laid upon  us and we are besieged. I think it is you that has some explaining to do unless the rumors of all you Rassvians being brigands and cutthroats was true, which would mean my mission her was all but pointless. Which would just add on to my list of things gone wrong today, of course. ”

Setzer raised an eyebrow at her turning to address his companions. “Invited by Balthazar? Is she crazy? Did we just pick up a crazy girl? Because I don’t deal with crazy all too well reminds me too much of my grandmother.”

Colette still holding her spell at the ready sighed and looked behind Setzer towards those that she knew were hiding out of her range of sight. “Listen. If you haven’t kill me at this point that means something. Can I please talk to somebody that doesn’t have an IQ of a fucking chipped brick?”[/indent][/color]