The zombie things were not powerful.  They were slow and fairly weak alone, or even in a small group.  It was perhaps only with greater numbers that they would become a great problem.  Well...there was ONE other issue.  Every time one of them blasted a zombie, you'd see a blob of X flying away, abandoning ship, as it were.  This was happening every time they were blasted, burnt, or splattered as such.  Now then, the X did this, but some of them [i]came back[/i] to re-inhabit the splorchy messes that had been plastered over walls and floors, reforming the zombie creature.  This was, sad to say, the result of every kill scored by Cass.  In this case, he blew them back and turned them to mush, but the protoplasm was able to be reformed by the next X-Parasite to inhabit it.  This was still helping, but it was the extreme heat damage of Kaze and David.  Where the flamethrower had failed to avail them outside, it was permanently rendering parasites 'bodyless', and Kaze's own special weapon was just too strong for the stuff to hold out against him.

Zen pulled in nearby, observing all this and taking the occasional pot-shot, speaking up after Amber had declared that the stairs down were several rooms away.  He assessed the situation, considered the likely variables in which the zombie monsters could attack them, and spoke.

[color=ed1c24][b]"Current X-forms are weak, but numerous.  They are also able to reform if significant heat damage is not inflicted.  It is suggested that Cassius and this unit take point to reduce all X in our path to protoplasm, followed directly after by David and Kaze to finish off disabled units in passing.  Calculations indicate this strategy will double progress to the stairs, due to the slow-moving nature of these enemies."[/b][/color]

In this situation, it was better to move forward instead of waiting for the enemy to exhaust itself.  They did not have the means to destroy the X, only impede them.  A spearhead attack that guarentees penetration to the lower floors was the best move to make...provided that something worse was not nestled within the base.  Zen moved forwards in order to blast apart the protoplasmic zombie and make the job of burning them to death much easier.  On the way, he would observe a large hole...leading up.  It was just ripped through the ceiling!  It looked like it may lead to the upper control room...  whatever came here ruined the functions and the observation equipment itself, and knew to do so.  There was no such hole in the floors, though, and there was no activity detected up there [i]now[/i].  And incidentally, the stairs?  Dark.  Just dark.  Not even emergency lighting was present.