One leg still raised in an unfinished step, Zsresrinn stopped in her tracks. She had let the comms chatter about Gourlan fly by without answer - even if the voidhanger's suspicions were correct, there was not much they could have done about it at that moment. Not until they had dealt with the enemy they knew. Her senses followed the movements of the rebels by the mortar emplacement through the remaining parasitic drone as it wove and ducked about the undergrowth, her body moving ahead almost by reflex. Rho-Hux's warning, however, made her hesitate. She had not thought the stalking beast was still so close. Abandoning her mobile eye for a moment, she focused her senses ahead of her. Still nothing clearly in sight, besides a fleshy shape slithering here and there, but she could smell it now, feel its body heat. The stench of several animals, and a very large thermal patch, though a pale one. Maybe cold-blooded.

"Understood." She readied her side-limbs' grip around her hellhammer as she passed on communications to the rest of the group as quietly as she could. "Insurgent patrol approaches, prepare to engage. Will attempt misdirection."

Zsresrinn had to acknowledge that she was in no way equipped for subtly hampering the enemy. All the same, the raw calculations of combat were clear: they were facing an adversary that matched their numbers and an unpredictable wild creature. One of these elements attacking another would lead to the third one taking advantage of the fight, and unless the group did something about it, most chances were that they would be on the losing side. Anything she could so much as try mattered.

She shifted her attention to the drone again, pushing it to rise into the air with an unnecessarily loud buzzing of its membranous wings. The symbiote was small and the sound it made was easily lost in the rustling and breathing around them, but she hoped that the large predator's honed senses or the insurgents' detection systems would be sharp enough to pick up on it. Even if they did, though, that might not be enough to have them focus on that. Driven by a direct mental command, the drone flew in a wide, exposed loop, bringing it onto the trajectory the tarrhaidim were approaching from, and dove at the plough-head, which she now could see more clearly from above. It was unlikely to survive if either foe did spot it, but that would be a small price to pay if it could get them to notice each other in time.