"[i]You got guts, son[/i]," came words from the darkest corner of their little slice of the hangar, squared away for what was now a proper squad formation. It wasn't so much the words or their implications sink, but that the voice was unknown yet privy to their argument. "[i]I like that."[/i]

The whip-thin frame of Phrike quickly turned to face this newest character, paranoia setting in his mind immediately as to which of the Arbites had been quiet enough to sneak up on them, hear their demoralizing tone and give them just enough time before fingering the detonater, taking out a whole squad at whim. Instead, he saw one of the most terrifying men he had seen - albeit calmed slightly by his lack of uniform, clad only in the dungarees of an Imperial Soldier and not the ornate white, full-face anonymity of an Arbites.

He came up to even Phrike's height, if not a bit shorter, but that didn't make him feel any better. He was as tall as he was wide and he took a few steps back as he came under scrutiny, fingers unconciously resting on his monoknife. 

"Guts? No... just..." He scrambled for words, scanning the room before he faked a smile, drawing wrinkles along the multiple tattoos on his face. "Just common sense."

"Where to, uhm... Sarge?" He asked, in queary to where they would be going in two hours. But the man was gone just as he came, into the darkness of the hangar and out of the range of care of the 8th Squad. He stared at the others for a moment, bewildered, before he returned to his bunk in an attempt to understand his lascarbine.
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Everything was a blur. From being grouped up and marched under duress into the confines of a much larger chamber, the mock details and the intentions they carried lost on even an educated man like Phrike under the guise of his own paranoia and fear. He could feel the base instincts of his being rise to the surface, his mind going blank as he began to hyperventilate, shaking so rapidly his rifle clattered to the ground in front of him.

In fact, if it hadn't so, he might not have been there. Scrambling to the ground after his weapon, shrapnel tore up the empty void he left and hit one of the 8th behind him. Without a care for the masculinty in it or the bravery of some of the others, he screamed, arterial spray from the man behind him warming the exposed left side of his face as he fell to the ground; dead. There was no point for Phrike to even check. No one survived having their entire throat ripped out by a jagged chunk of metal.

Like an animal, he resorted to what he knew. He found a familiar face, the quiet Guardswoman, and he picked up his rifle with one hand as he scrambled low to the ground, impossibly low, as the barriers around him scorched and splintered, jagged chunks of metal embedding in the frame of the door as he passed it, coming up behind the woman and planting a hand on her shoulder, fearful she'd turn and openly cauterize him. If she cared even to turn, she'd find the man with watering eyes - whether from his own emotions, dust or smoke, it was hard to tell. He was barely holding onto his rifle, instead it was slung over his shoulder as he held onto the tattered remains of the man the woman had just stabbed.

He had a hand over the man's stomach wound, barely aware that this man prior to them had attempted to put lasfire on the woman through the doorframe. In fact, he dragged the man, still bleeding, into the bunker under the guise of gunfire, protected only by random debris. In that time, however, the man had gone into shock, bled out and died. By the time the Cutman got into the bunker with Octavia, his efforts were for nil - the man was dead and he was hauling him uselessly, barely able to get him into the door.

"Terra!" He cursed, a stray beam hitting the wall next to him and sending him scurrying into the ground, now using the dead man as cover. He drew his monoknife and began to cut the vest from the remains of the man, even with a giant hole resting just above the belly. With a resounding amount of effort, he pulled and the vest came free. Just in time too, as he threw it over himself and stood next to the woman, albeit not as confident. In a tone he was not quite proud of, more desperate than he hoped, "What do we do!?"