[center][h2][b]Ilshar Ard’sabekh[/b][/h2][/center]

With a storm of gunfire and comms interference, it began. It [i]had[/i] been a trap after all by the looks of it, but Ilshar was past the point of congratulating himself for seeing it coming. It was less of an achievement than a bare minimum for survival in situations like these. And if he wanted to cling to that life-giving threshold of performance, now was not the time for gratification, but action. Sensory organs blossomed over his exposed membranous hide, globular protrusions and spiral-sunken circles that glowed with putrid grey-green luminescence. Enhanced senses swept the tangle of houses, overlaying sight, smell and more esoteric modes of perception still. The tang of smoke and metal from projectile trails. The ill-describable, but unpleasant taste of qillatu discharge- no. The etheric blast that arched towards the gigantic Echo had come from too far away for his perception of the source to be useful to him even if he could pinpoint it.

But perhaps it could be to something else.

The human close to Ilshar called for a grenade. Not a bad idea, that, perhaps he should have prepared some. Too late for that now.

[b]"No grenades,"[/b] he growled in reply, [b]"Keep shooting. Give cover. I'll take the ether-blaster."[/b]

Finding heavier cover, as their pointman had called out, was easier said than done when every passage between the buildings could have been a killing corridor. The best he could do was move away from the corner and towards the central point of the house he was hunkered behind. It would put him closer to the still suspiciously open door, but it seemed a more acceptable risk than sprinting across the ambushers' line of fire.

Weapon slung across his chest, Ilshar raised his arms and retracted most of his sight organs, turning his focus inward. Semi-material senses reached inward, through and beyond semi-ethereal entrails. He had sometimes heard that, according to physicists, the act of observing something could provoke a change. While he had never been one to study anything quantum, the principle rang true to him. Not because of any persuasive argument, but from simple, tangible experience. [i]Looking into the Chasm is more than perception - it's bait.[/i]

The space between his upheld hands darkened, as if some invisible shape were filtering the daylight directly above it. Startlingly, the ground below remained clearly lit. In a moment, there was a blurring, a folding of perspective, as if the tarrhaidim and the house behind him had been a drawing on a piece of translucent paper that was being folded around that one point in midair. The suspended shadow grew deeper, expanded - and then it was gone, and something writhed in its place. A sinuous form twice as long as Ilshar's arm twisted through the air, as if swimming through water, crystalline in its transparency and yet oozingly, unmistakably organic. [i]Smell. Seek. Hunt.[/i] The ether-worm whirled, circular tooth-ringed jaw snapping, and slid away, towards the direction where the blast had come from.

Ilshar leaned against the building's wall, dizziness coursing through him as implanted and template-bred organs fought to absorb the qillatu diffusing from him exertion. The moments immediately after reaching into the Chasm were the worst. The most dangerous. He could only pray to the source of all that churned and slithered that the rest of the team was keeping the enemy distracted enough.