[center][u][b]CORDELIA LYNN HOLMES[/b][/u][/center]

Lynn was getting sick of this shit.

There was rustling in the woods behind her and Lynn tensed, primed to grab this bitch and rotisserie cook her ass. [i]You two dipshits,[/i] Lynn cursed. [i]One of you can teleport and the other can do illusions and you come sprinting out the fucking woods?[/i] Lynn's mind quickly disregarded that - no, it couldn't have been them, it was a third party - or Arianna's back up, or dipshits from the hangout in the woods. Either way Lynn moved forward. Arianna had failed Lynn's little test. She wasn't a prisoner here - and if she was willing to lie to Lynn, she merited an ass-beating. 

Behind her, a voice shouted for her to move. [i]Holmes?[/i] Lynn obliged, moving to the side in such a way she could keep her eye on Arianna while watching this newcomer. The cop? Rafferty? And the cyborg dancer. [i]Interesting,[/i] Lynn thought. Gennedy had told her that the robot was dead, and she'd seen him before in the mall, but Keaton said the other cops had chased after him. But now he was working with one. [i]Division in the ranks,[/i] Lynn thought, a smile stretching across her flushed face. Lynn was not entirely sure which people were putting pieces on the board, but she was starting to get an idea of who the players were. If this cop wanted to take the fall for attacking her, Lynn wasn't going to stop him. 

He drew out a taser but - no. That wasn't a taser. Lynn had been shocked by enough of them to know. Fire dancing across her shoulders, Lynn felt her blood run cold. [i]Those fucking bastards,[/i] she realized, eyes widening. [i]I hope they both die. I hope they both fucking die.[/i] Radvi shot her with the taser and the woman simply disintegrated into blue goo. [i]Does it do that to every para, or just her?[/i] Lynn wondered, feeling her feet dance in her shoes. If Radvi turned to her she wasn't going to take chances, not with that fucking thing in his hands.

But he kept going. Lynn followed cautiously. He reloaded. He'd shot twice. Lynn tucked that information away for later. As far as she was concerned, this situation had just become a win-win. Gennedy's attack dog dying, Arianna dying, Arianna getting apprehended, Arianna just showing off her abilities - whatever information Lynn got was useful, and Keaton could process it better than she could. Lynn stayed close - far enough to duck behind a tree if Radvi tried to tase her, close enough that no witnesses could claim in good faith that her actions were construable as those of a little bitch.

Radvi went out into the woods, D close behind. Then Arianna trucked him. She threw the robot down the deadfall, and Lynn's eyes narrowed. [i]Strong and fast,[/i] Lynn thought. [i]And there's two of her.[/i] She flipped Radvi like - [sub]Salamandra[/sub] and grabbed the taser, snapping it in half. [i]Well, there's at least one good thing that bitch did.[/i] Radvi's pistol fired off and she took the shots like they were nothing. Lynn was still confident she could win that fight - a statement that applies to literally anyone Lynn is considering fighting - but she was going to be tough. When the shots hit her, she rippled like jelly. There had been some kind of blue slime back there, too. [i]This bitch is Flubber,[/i] Lynn thought.

Arianna threw him down the deadfall too, and Lynn braced herself to get involved. There was one more gunshot, but there was no way that Radvi could have - "Christ, they're all as dumb as Gennedy," Lynn muttered. She stayed low and still, watching. Arianna seemed to melt into the dirt, and after a few moments the forest returned to normal. Lynn cocked her head, waiting for the woman to reappear, to materialize behind her, but it seemed she'd gotten while the getting was good.

First things first.

Lynn went over to the broken taser and grabbed it, examining it gently in her hands. She was far too hot right now to risk holding it for long, so she scrambled over to a tree a few yards out the way and tucked the remaining pieces under a rock. This wasn't the best hiding spot, but Lynn was slightly drunk and there wasn't a lot of time. She was more than likely going to be interrogated for this, and she didn't want that on her when it happened. Still, it could be useful. Maybe Keaton could reverse-engineer it or do some science shit to it. She made a mental note of what the tree looked like - exactly like every other tree, it seemed - and stood back up.

Then Lynn went over to the deadfall, looking down. Her body cast enough light in the dark forest that she could see well enough, and she looked for a moment for a clear spot. Even the robot looked severely fucked up. [i]I take it back, he and Cara should hook up.[/i] Lynn took a step or two to the side and then jumped down. As she jumped, a surge of warm hair seemed to burst up beneath her and she fell at perhaps half the speed the laws of physics would normally dictate that she should, walking out of the six foot drop. She looked around for a brief moment, wondering vaguely how she was supposed to get out. 

"Shit," she muttered. She turned back to Radvi. He'd really managed to fuck himself. There wasn't a much better way to put it. Lynn went to pull the sleeves up over her hands but her hoodie was back in the dorm room. Damnit. Not that she was getting a real trial here, but she wasn't leaving fingerprints. Lynn kneeled down before Radvi, the smell of iron and gunpowder overwhelming. Lynn had seen people get shot before - [i]for a brief moment, Lynn heard a scream, like hers, just like hers, and she was younger, and she was cold, colder than she had[/i] - but no one had managed to shoot themselves to this degree.

"I don't know if you can hear me," Lynn said, looking down at the mangled bloody ruin of Radvi's face, "But if you keep doing stuff this dumb, you'll have Gennedy's job in no time." Lynn considered cauterizing it but that would basically just mean burning off his face at this point. Lynn, for all the ire she held for the powers that be on the Promise, was not about to not help this man. She was far too implicated at this point. It took only a few seconds of mental calculus to decide on that. She could be placed here by Eli and Amelia, one or both of whom would definitely flip. Wasn't Eli talking to this cop before? Yeah, it wouldn't take much convincing there. They leave, gunshots, dead cop, Lynn over the body. If she was in prison, she couldn't help Keaton. Helping him might even get some of the heat off her back, and give them more wiggle room for their investigation. Plus, there was the robot there. She didn't know if he would narc or not - he assaulted children, so she leaned towards no - but she'd have to melt his ass too, and that would for sure put her at the scene of the crime.

And, a very quiet voice, one that sounded like Lucy, or maybe Eli, or maybe Keaton, reminded Lynn it was the right thing to do. Even if he lived, he wasn't going to be back in action anytime soon. He wouldn't be hurting any kids. A cog out of the ugly, rusted machine that let Arianna murder hundreds and kept children locked up (upstairs?) was happening either way.

Lynn closed her eyes for a moment, knowing that time was of the essence, but hating herself for what she was about to do. All she could think of was Che walking to the edge of the deadfall, looking down, shaking his head. God, if anyone she knew from juvy knew about this.

"Gearbox," Lynn said, turning to Freaky D. Maybe he was a Roomba, maybe he was a parahuman, maybe he was a Decepticon, maybe he was one of those dudes from that band. Lynn didn't care, but didn't feel particularly inclined to treat him with much consideration. D was a staunch negative in her book. "I don't know if you have, like, 5G or some shit in there, but call some medics or some shit." Lynn pulled out her cell phone and turned it on, waiting for it to come up. Lynn scanned around for any cloth she could use. Her own clothes hung to her in shredded, smoking rags, and she resolved to get something heat-retardant. [i]How come we don't have those X-men suits, huh?[/i] "Or start making a way out of here." she looked at him. Did this thing even speak English? "Like a ladder. Ladder." she mimed it. "And I swear to fuck, if you try to dropkick me like you did Anderson, I will melt you down into a - " Lynn paused. Damnit, she almost had it. She was still a little drunk, and her mind was racing. "Just...whatever." Lynn turned back to Radvi, offered the least convincing sorry in human history, and ripped off a chunk of his pants as quickly as she could. If he was awake or alive, that probably was not pleasant. Lynn balled up the cloth in her hands, noting that there was some dirt, but her options weren't really great. It quickly became warm in her hands anyway, and she hoped that was good enough. Lynn pressed the cloth to the open maw that was half of Radvi's face and tried to angle him so the blood flowed off him and not back down his throat. He'd probably already swallowed half his teeth or something.

Lynn's phone buzzed with a ringtone that had not been utilized in most phones since the late 90s. "Cara," Lynn said, her forearms soaked in blood. [i]If I go to fucking prison or get the needle for this, I swear to God.[/i]

"Yes, Miss Holm - "

"Alert someone on security who's not a dipshit that there's a dipshit who shot himself. We need, like, help, or whatever. I don't know his name. You know where I am." 

"Who else is with you?"

Lynn paused. She turned and looked at D, who was twitching. [i]Even the fucking machines have panic attacks here.[/i] Lynn wasn't sure what the play here was. Did this guy want her to say? Lynn was not about to pin someone else to this scene. That was a [i]major[/i] little bitch move. She said nothing. D could speak for himself. Well, figuratively. She didn't know if she had to knock on his head in binary or something to get a message through. "This guy's gonna be as dead as Gary if you don't hurry your ass up, Cara, maybe tell me how to put someone's jaw back on?" 

Lynn felt her back uncomfortably open to the ledge above. If Arianna was waiting, trying to lure someone in, her plan was working. [i]Why is it always terrible options?[/i] "You stupid motherfucker," Lynn muttered to herself, pressing as hard as she dared on Radvi's open face. "Christ." She had an eye on Radvi's pistol but had not touched it. If Arianna came back, she'd make good use of it. She'd eaten the bullets before, but bullets had a bit more kick around Lynn. Lynn was a firm believer that no one was ever improved by being shot a couple of times. Briefly, Lynn considered emptying the gun into the dirt to try and draw more help, but decided against it. This was as much as she was sticking her ass on the line for a Promise police officer.

Lynn was left, in the isolated part of your brain that thinks strange things in terrible times, wondering if she should get drunk more or less often.