“[color=skyblue]Besca what’s happening! W-why did Ghaust’s feed just cut out! [i]Besca[/i]! I’m in, I’m ready l-let me go down![/color]”

Besca squeezed her eye shut, teeth grit together so hard she thought they might crack. When she opened them again she tried not to look at Hadrian’s grayed-out signal. She tried to focus on the screens, on the carnage turning Hovvi to rubble. 

“[color=skyblue][i]Besca![/i][/color]”

“[color=gray]The elevator is down there![/color]” Besca snapped, harsher than she meant. “[color=gray]Stand by until it’s back up![/color]”

“[color=skyblue]People are dying down there! Let me drop! We practiced I—I’ve done it before, let me drop![/color]” 

“[color=gray]You’re not primed, just…just wait for the lift and you’ll be phased by the time you get down there—[/color]”

“[color=skyblue]No, I’m connecting now. If the elevator isn’t up by the time I’m phased, I’m dropping.[/color]”

Besca’s heart skipped, she scrolled to the hangar’s feed and watched as Dahlia vanished behind Dragon’s head. “[color=skyblue]Dammit—no! [i]Dahlia[/i]—[/color]”

The comm cut, Dahlia had deafened herself. Besca swapped over to transport. 

“[color=gray]Send it up! Send it up now we’re deploying Dragon![/color]”

[hr][hr]
The world was a dark blur to her, but as she ran she’d hear the sounds change. The screaming—at least the pained screaming—grew distant, was overshadowed by the rolling of vehicles, and the panic of a meager crowd. 

When she looked around she’d find herself at the foot of the elevator’s anchor. The platform had landed. Behind her was the tertiary barricade, manned by a skeleton crew compared to what had been at the first and second. They fired into the dark; by now all they could do was avoid the roads and hope they were only hitting the creatures. 

Aside from her, there were only a few dozen other civilians—at least on foot. That was all. She’d run so long and so far and only this many people had made it. Armored transports climbed a ramp onto the platform, but even those altogether couldn’t have added up to more than one or two hundred. 

“Hey! Kid!” A soldier shouted, running over to her. “Come on, we’re lifting in one minute, you need to get on!”

He took her by the shoulder, started leading her up the ramp, but something was wrong still. Something in her twisted—her blood, it was her blood, like it was spinning in her veins, making a whirlpool out of her. It had screamed at her to run to get here to get [i]up[/i] and safe to Aerie to Besca but now…now [i]what?[/i] Now what did it want? Why did that feeling from the boat come crawling back, the panic, not hers but thrust upon her. Alien. 

[color=black]RUN[/color] it had said but now it didn’t. Now it said something else. Said it in that way that wasn’t words, but the breath between words, the intent. It was foggy, distant, until she finally got onto the platform. 

[color=black]GET OFF[/color]

[color=black]QUINNLASH GET OFF[/color]

“What the fuck?”

Those words were real, and from the soldier. He let her go, staring off into the dark town. 

[i]Jubilee[/i] had the Modir bound, had one chain wrapped around its neck, burning through flesh and steel but [i]slow[/i]. It thrashed, but she was quick, sturdy. She kicked out its legs, locked its arm to its chest with her other chain. She pulled, she burned. The cannon lay discarded. 

Behind them another shape emerged from the night. Another giant, but one of its arms was gone. It sprinted through the town in a maddened panic, heedless to the buildings, to the creatures or the people that it crushed underfoot on its way. It kicked over transports, its footsteps left hollows in the ground that crumbled and brought buildings down in its wake. 

It was [i]Magnifique[/i], and he was coming straight for the elevator.