Arkfall Part, II

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Scene Title	Arkfall, Part II
Synopsis	When Ferrymen operatives attempt to rescue prisoners from B-Ring's medical ward, each and every hell breaks loose.
Date	November 8, 2011

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The Commonwealth Arcology

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Once, the Commonwealth Arcology was a dream of a better future. Somewhere along the way, that dream became polluted beyond recognition. Physically, the arcology is designed to evoke positive emotions and lighten spirits. Its walls are a sterile white, plants grow in climate-controlled alcoves to add a splash of natural decor. Everything was tailored to feel like a paradise away from the troubles of the real world.

That paradise is destroyed.

«Security Alert. Intrusion Detected. Arcology Environmental Containment Breached.»

The warning has been echoing from loudspeakers since the Ferrymen breached the wall of B-Ring. They weren’t immediately by security, however. Veronica Sawyer did her job well and routed all security upstairs to A-Ring, giving the Ferrymen and their allies time to maneuver into position and split up within the massive facility before engaging. But that was then, and this is now.

Once pristine white walls are scarred by pockmarks from gunfire and explosions. Blood pops brightly against the white tile floor, corpses of security forces dressed in black uniforms contrasting sharply. Security lighting bathes most of the halls in flashing shades of warning red. Once locked doors are automatically popping open as the technopath D.Crypt undoes all of the precautions the Institute put in place to prevent a catastrophe like this.

«Security Alert. Intrusion Detected. Arcology Environmental Containment Breached.»

“According to this information, there’s a prisoner detention block up ahead in whatever this medical wing is.” Jolene Chevalier never came here before, not in her time. The arcology never existed in her future, the entire subterranean settlement is a monument to diverging timelines. Regarding the intelligence that Brian and Veronica were able to obtain, she motions ahead to a white security door with a keypad next to it.

“Sawyer’s info says this was a medical research wing, but there’s containment areas? I’m not really sure what to expect.” Her green eyes divert to Gillian, not far away, and it's evident that her daughter is concerned. So much of this place is uncharted territory. Even Sawyer’s information was only partial, only scratched the surface of what this institution might actually contain.

«Security Alert. Intrusion Detected. Arcology Environmental Containment Breached.»

Lynette and Kaylee close up the rear of the team, and behind them there is a distant sound of gunfire and screams, some of which are terrified children. The entire Ark has fallen into complete chaos. The noise becomes more distant the closer this team closes in on the medical wing. Soon, though, they reach the doors at the end of the hall.

“D.Crypt,” Lene calls into her radio, “unlock the medical research wing entrance.” There’s a pop-click of a magnetic lock releasing, and the doors slowly slide open into the walls, revealing a nearly pitch-black room lined with rows and rows of gurneys, upon which lay bodies covered with blue cloths. Respirators, EEGs, and IV bag stands rest at the side of each row of bodies. There must be dozens of people in there.

“W— what the hell?” Lene asks, one hand raising to cover her mouth.

What hell indeed.

“Expect the worst,” Lynette says, dryly, to Jolene’s commentary. It isn’t a joke, not really, she just really would like it to be. From her place at the back, she turns to look behind them. Screams and gunfire are not the most reassuring thing, and she’s keeping an eye out for a renewed volley from the security teams here. She has a gun, but it’s sitting in a holster, rather than being held ready. Perhaps she’s saving the bullets.

She only moves ahead when she hears Lene’s reaction to the opened doors. Taking in the scene, her lips tug into a frown, but she doesn’t look away. This is the sort of thing they’re here to stop, after all. Instead of answering what the hell, she nods to the others. “Come on. Let’s see if there’s anything to be done for these people.” Her tone is somewhat cold, despite seeming to have only good intentions. She hasn’t seen enough of this to be numb to it. Or maybe she’s seen too much of it. After all, those gurneys have a sort of familiarity about them.

There is already a small pressure between her eyes, as Kaylee’s ability has already been at work, making the journey a little easier. She hated to split away from Doyle, but she had to go where she was needed. This meant turning away the attention of guards, sending them in a different direction with a wave of her hand and a placed thought.

Turning away from where they had been, to look to where they were going; Kaylee lifts her chin a little as she glances past the others to the room beyond. Eyes widen immediately, “Oh my god,” she whispers softly, fingers tightening around weapon, and ammo, she had managed to take from the dead fingers of a guard. No reason for it going to waste.

It disturbed her a little that she was finding those little manipulations… fun.

I guess you can’t hide your demons that well.  Though the scene beyond them, does a fine job throwing water on that part of her mind.  Footsteps crunch on floor debris, but she does move forward — towards the ward — mind casting out to look for signs of life.  

When needed, Gillian has offered a small boost in energy to those around her, either with a touch of her hand, or from a distance. Her power doesn't always offer the most help in certain situations, but it might have helped get past other barriers of a sort. Otherwise, she's carrying a weapon. An assault rifle, to be specific. Semi-automatic, and she hasn't wasted bullets, saving it for when it's needed.

The medical wing brings back… far too many memories. There's a reason she wanted to be on this team. With a slow inhale, she looks around at the people hooked up to IVs and respirators and shakes her head. "We might not be able to do anything for them, unless one of you has medical training." When a machine breaths for someone, it's hard to breathe without it. They might not have time to get them awake and out. But that doesn't mean she doesn't look around for people they might actually be able to help.

Someone not completely reliant on machines. Someone who could be woken up quickly, hopefully.

"Keep an eye out for the doctors." She is.

At a conservative head-count, Lynette estimates there’s at least fifty people in this room. As she moves in at the head of the team, Jolene follows a few paces behind, anxiously clenching her hands into fists. In the dim light offered by the few ceiling lamps that are turned on, shadows are deep and play tricks on the eye. Each body in the room is monitored not by a sophisticated ACTS unit, but basic hospital equipment. Unusually, each is covered from head to toe in a blue cloth, as though they were a cadaver. But the EEG and EKG readings show life-signs.

Jolene looks back to Gillian as her mother comes in, and Lynette reaches down to pull up one of the sheets and look at the man below. Caucasian male, late 30s or early 40s, blonde, pale. She drops the sheet and eyes the EKG, then pulls up another sheet. Lynette’s breath hitches in the back of her throat, and she throws the sheet back to reveal the same man. Looking around the room, there’s a commonality on each covered body, the vital signs are repeating in unison to one-another. There’s no variance, there’s no change.

They’re all the same person.

“What the fuck?”

A room full of clones is enough to unsettle Lynette, and she steps back from one gurney only to find herself bumping into another. With a bit of a jump, she backs away from that one, too, and looks over at Gillian. “Medical training,” she repeats, focusing on the other woman’s words, on a plan, “I certainly don’t. Whoever this is…” Her head tilts a little, but her thought goes unfinished. And she opts to leave the eerie, synchronized beeps behind and picks her way through the room. Her footfalls are deliberate. And a touch too quick.

“Jolene,” she says, without looking back at their time traveling navigator, “you said something about containment units?”

Gently, Kaylee pulls down the sheets of one of the bodies, noting what the others do about the appearances of the men.  She doesn't walk away, however, but studies the face in front of her. Hmm.

The telepath decided to go one step further, reaching out with her ability. Tentatively touching the surface of the man’s mind, Kaylee’s brow furrows, but what she finds has her recoiling mentally and physically.

“Brain dead.” Her telepathy sweeps out, touching other dead minds. “All of them,” she adds in surprise.

Kaylee doesn't hesitate to flick the sheet back over the deathly still face, a little shiver going up her spine. “I wonder what they were used for,” she can't help but ask that allows, tone curious.

Forty some clones of the same man. Gillian looks around the room with a tinge of— something in her eyes for a time as she clenches her hand around the assault rifle that she 'borrowed' from one of the guards. She can imagine this is a power. Not only because it would likely be impossible, but because of who is behind this place. Moving past the bodies, she spots something else, a far back by some doors.

A laptop on a rolling cart. She's not a hacker like those that have gotten them through the doors, but she knows a decent enough about computers to do practical means of finding information before trying to do something drastic.

"Patient file for Julien Dumont. Cloning ability being… harvested for resources. That doesn't sound good… Guy didn't log out. D. Stephens," She almost laughs, until she realizes. "I think he's still here."

There’s a clattering sound from nearby. One of the doors into the room rattles, as though stuck, followed by a fierce slam that sends it swinging open violently into the room filled with Dumont clones. For the briefest of moments, it feels as though a fight is about to break out. But then –

“Eve,” is strained from the other side of the door. “Goddamnit.” Robyn Quinn’s voice is ever recognizable, and the brow-raised blunt-as-ever Eve Mas poking her head in through the open door is as subtle as a sledgehammer. The prophet and musician look equally as surprised to have crossed paths with the others in this place. Eve’s meandering of labyrinthine passageways and twisting corridors didn’t bring the women where they intended to be. But, accidentally, where they were needed.

“Quinn,” Lene hisses in excitement, trying to be both joyous and whisper at the same time. Swiftly navigating the corridors between Dumont clones, Lene catches up to the dark-haired woman and claps a hand on her shoulder. “Glad you’re ok,” comes with an awkward smile, followed by a hushed. “This place is awful.”

“Jolene?” Lynette reiterates, causing the redhead to whip around, remembering she was asked something.

With a small gasp, Lene motions to a pair of double doors. “Oh! Yes ah, the — ACTS. They’re usually what the Institute stores people in, they’re like,” she makes a box gesture with her hands. “Coffins they keep people comatose in. I — I mean, I’m assuming they’re deeper inside. I don’t know why they’re doing this with… with this guy, though. I’ve never heard of him.”

An eyebrow lifts as Gillian reads out the information she finds. Lynette’s lips curl into a grimace and she glances back to the beds. Poor man. But when Gillian goes on, Lynette looks back to her, a shiver running down her spine that she will deny later, but certainly can’t right now. She looks around like she’s expecting D. Stephens to pop out from a dark corner and eat them all alive. “Kaylee,” she asks in a whisper, “can you feel anyone else here?” Besides them.

So when the door rattles, Lynette swings around that way, even drawing her gun and pointing it in that direction. It’s really just luck and timing that keep her from firing on her own people. Quinn’s voice makes her relax with a heavy sigh and she reholsters her weapon. Her hand runs through her hair and she turns back to Lene as she finally gets her answer.

“Right. The coffins. Let’s see if we can get to those and get some people out. Any chance that we won’t have to carry them all out?” Comatose is — ya know — a problem.

A glance to Lynette, a small nod and Kaylee’s chin tilts up a little, with blue eyes sliding closed. The others cannot feel it, but Kaylee’s ability flares out around her… spreading and seeking….

Until…

«There!»

The telepath’s head whips around like a bloodhound onto a scent, staring – unseeing – somewhere beyond it. “He’s running away. Scared.” After a moment, her eyes blink slowly, then a little faster as she lets her ability pulled back again. Finally, she sighs softly. “He’s out of my range, now,” is offered in apology. Which means that there is no immediate danger from one D. Stevens, at least.

At the door rattling, her rifle starts to come up; but pauses part way when her telepathy reaches there first. She knows those minds and it causes her to break out into a little bit of a smile, despite the scene around her. Sometimes, it nice to find a friendly mind on the other side of the door

"Goddamnit," Quinn repeats, giving Eve a gentle shove. "I think we're still lost Eve. I told you I had no sense of-"

The voices get Quinn to stop, blink, and look towards the other that occupy the room. She and Eve had just been barreling from door to door, handling problems as they come up - a flick of Quinn's wrist, a shot from Eve's gun. It has maybe made Quinn a little sloppy, not even thinking to look as they step into the room. Oops. It's a good thing she didn't follow their pattern here.

"Jolene?" she echoes, trying to be quiet, before looking to Lynette, Kaylee, and Gillian. The hand on her shoulder (why is everyone taller than her) causes an earbud to slip out of her ear, music still blasting from it as Quinn takes hold of it. A relieved sigh escapes her lips, smile widening across her face. "God, it's so nice t' see some frien… dly… face… es?" It's looking around the room that gives her pause, lips pursing as she looks back up and around at the others. "In the thick of it, eh? Alright, awful… what're you all on t' here?"

She turns a palm so that it faces upwards, the motion done with a very Quinn-like flourish. As the tips of her fingers glow, a ball of light coalesces in her hand, which she quickly releases to float around her, shedding a bit more light for all of them - and provide other uses if she needs it to. She tries not to wince as her head throbs a bit, a grimace crossing her face.

“What, Quinnie,” comes a voice from around the door before Eve peeks her head into the room looking not in the direction of the other women in the room at first but in the opposite corner. “We had to get the door open somehow and I can’t help that you don't know where north i-.” The Adventures of Quinnie and Evie have not stopped at all. Her mouth snaps open as she spots Gillian, Lene and the rest.

“Gilly! Lene! I've been looking everywhere for you!” She whispers as soft as she can which isn't the most soft really and creeps into the room alongside her fellow musician turned rebel. Her desert eagle sits in one hand dangling at her side, shotgun still slung over her back she hasn't had too many reasons to use it yet.

As Lene rushes over to greet Quinn, Eve grins at the future daughter of awesome and leans in. “So good to see you again Chicken.” She reaches out to ruffle Lene’s hair before tip toeing over to Gillian. Taking note of the.. Ah the Brian Wannabes laid out across the room. Her eyebrows raise even further and she whispers to her best friend reaching out to take a hand, “Sorry I’m late. Wires get crossed. Had to make a stop and grab one of my paintings.” All said very fast the oracle shaking her messenger bag at Gillian the top of a rolled up painting can be seen and the rattling of some items can be heard within, looking over at Lynette and Kaylee she dips her knees for both.

“This place is all sorts of wrong. I don't even remember it feeling so wrong when I was here before.” That's probably because of all the drugs they had her own to stabilize her psychosis.

"I guess smart men run," Gillian mutters quietly, as she steps away from the computer as the telepath confirms that they aren't going to be set upon by that doctor at least. Instead they get set upon by friends, which is much better than Institute doctors. "You ladies are lucky we're not trigger happy," she teases, as she moves across the room to offer them both a nod, and Eve a hand on the arm. She'd offer more, but she has a assault rifle in her arms.

"My guess is they're keeping these guys for organ transfers and stuff. Which is gross, but, this whole place is gross." She would not put it past this place to grow clones from a dude's power just to harvest organs from. "Let's go find people who aren't all brain dead."

Gillian won’t have to look far. As she’d said, smart men do run. Away from danger. There’s a scream from somewhere deeper into the lab, a primal howl neither human nor animal, but decidedly organic. Lene’s eyes widen to saucers when she hears it, reaches out and grabs Quinn’s forearm as tightly as she can.

Something triggers inside of Kaylee’s mind, a low-lying background static. Not the full interference from another telepath, but there’s something familiar about the feeling that she just can’t quite shake. It’s like a familiar scent of another person, something that clings to the back of her mind and brings back sensory memories of…

Peter?

No, an ability he had once. Something lingering, something unusual, something — Kaylee recognizes it a moment too late as the double doors on the far end of the room explode open. A single man, or what was once a man comes bursting into the room, draped in just the blood-stained and tattered remnants of a hospital gown. IV tubes are still hooked up to his arms, blue fluid weeping from the plastic and phosphorescing on the floor. It looks like Refrain.

But the dark-skinned and horribly mutilated man standing in the doorway doesn’t act like a person. There’s scars all over his face, like reconstructive surgery, where an eye once was. They’re healed bullet holes, but in unusual and strange configurations. His posture is awkward, pained, and unnatural. As he screams, Lene lets out a high-pitched whine of fright and stumbles back a step, bumping into one of the Dumont tables.

Gillian recognizes him immediately. As does Eve, against all odds. Because — he died.

“Knox?” is a whisper on Eve’s lips.

The creature that is left of Benjamin Knox’s body flips over one of the tables holding a Dumont clone, flinging it end over end and sending the unconscious body directly at Eve, sending her sprawling to the ground with the weight of an unclothed and blanket-tangled adult body’s weight atop her. Knox rushes ahead, pushing tables aside, moving on a bee-line straight for Quinn. As he moves, strange emerald green sparks glitter and drift over his bare skin.

Whatever plan might have been in Lynette’s mind a moment ago, it’s gone when she hears those screams. That howl. And when its source comes bursting in, she whips around and ducks behind one of the gurneys. There’s a beat before she peeks up over the edge, taking an actual look at the body that has come for them. Her eyes take in scars, tubes… and Refrain.

She remembers the last time she saw it — took it. It was Christmas. Less than a year ago. And the thought hits her, how nice it would be to be drifting in some happy memory rather than be here, risking her life. All their lives.

A shudder runs through her and her hands grip the sheet over the body she hides behind. Knox heads for Quinn and Lynette vaults over the gurney to run in his direction. For a moment, even she doesn’t know if she’s doing it to save her friend or for a chance at the drug lingering in those tubes.

She makes the decision at the last second and fires her electricity at the creature.

At the first sight of the thing, Kaylee can’t help but take a step back from it, maybe a few more, at least until her movement is blocked by something. “Uh… guys…” This was not what she expected when she first noticed it the sensation. She doesn’t know what to think of it.

The scream makes her jump, eyes widening a little. “What…” When it starts to charge, her eyes unfocus – thought still on it — and her body goes still for a moment. Bracing herself for what she is about to try, Kaylee’s hands come up as Lynette lets loose her charge.

«STOP!»

There is no need for the telepath to be gentle here, she slams that word into that monstrosities mind, wincing at the strength of those mental barriers. Pushing and shoving that idea into its mind. Re-enforcing it with the concept of friends – really?  It was all she could think of in a hurry.

Quinn only has a second to look around at the various bodies again and wonder why it's all Boys from Brazil down here when she hears Lene let out a whine, Eve's voice turning her attention to the strange, shambling creature that looks like something out of one of the video games that Magnes tried to get her to play once. The ball of light floating around her stops, than-

"Merde!" she shouts, stumbling to the side and away from Eve, suddenly sprawled out by one of the many bodies. A gurney doesn't let her get far, turning back to face the creature, gun held up. As Electricity crackles, she fires off a shot, at the same time detonating the ball of light in a manner that fills the room with disorienting light, in the hopes that the flash-crackle pairing - perhaps with the telepathic command she's unaware of - can get the creature to stop in its tracks.

No warning for the others, unfortunately, but fear makes her react that way sometimes.

There's a reunion happening and it's not just between Eve with Gillian and the others. A former alley, PARIAH teammate. But this teammate is twisted now and Eve holds her hand up to her mouth in shock as the man she used to know flips tables and sends a body flying into the oracle. “Cazzo!”

The blonde’s body which if not brain dead and unconscious might otherwise excite the dark haired woman but in this situation she can only swear in her father’s native tongue in response as the body of the replicator sends her to the floor sprawled out. Just as she hits the floor.

Quinn’s light bomb detonates and the singer yells, her firearm drops just out of reach as she tries to grab at it hurriedly. “Knox noooooo! Don't eat my friends please! They’re not food!” Blinking furiously the woman scrambles to free herself wiggling out from underneath Julien’s body and she coughs patting her chest as the ladies spring to action.

Her fingertips just about grasp the grip of her Desert Eagle and she's pinching it down so she can close her whole hand around it. Using the fallen man for leverage to push herself up again the oracle looks on in terror at the Zombie Knox closing in on her friends. She lifts her firearm shakily at first. Still on her knees but leaning over one of the other cloth covered bodies of Julien. She prepares to fire.

"Fuck," Gillian mutters under her breath at the sight of a former friend, someone who'd once helped her train to fight, to use his power to save the world. Someone who she'd heard had died, though she didn't even remember who told her. Even if she hadn't known he'd died, seeing him in this state would have clenched it. Nothing living looked like that.

If he still had his power, the fear that she felt would not have helped matters in their case. The fear she knew those around her likely felt would not help. He would feed off it, gain strength from it. Lightning and balls of light scorch after images into her eyes and once again she yelps out a far less foreign, "Fuck." and backs away, the assault rifle raised in front of her, but not firing. She doesn't want to fire when she can't fucking see. Instead she reaches out in another way, opening up the knot in the back of her head. A violet glow appears around her, to those who can still see— the energy reaches out, careful in who it targets. She one of those closest to her, someone she can only see out of the corner of her eye, between those blotched afterimages.

The same woman who'd helped her take the kids across to Canada, who could throw lightning. Lynette.

The report of Eve’s handgun might as well be a clap of thunder indoors. The kick from the heavy handgun jostles her back, and the impact of the round tears through Knox’s midsection in a way that should drop an ordinary person, and yet Knox is unphased. Blood pulses out of the injury, and then the entire room floods with light. There’s a massive rollicking sound of screams, smashing tables, arcing lightning, and then –

“I got this!” Red hair swirling around her, Jolene Petrelli draws all the excess light in the room to a sphere hovering above her palm. Electricity snaps off of her body, arcs and grounds out on the floor. Kaylee’s mental thrust causes Knox to arrest his movement, allowing Lynette to strike him with a bolt of electricity that sends him crumpling to his knees.

But then he lunges, back up at her, grabbing the electrokinetic by the shoulders and squeezing. Lene flicks her green eyes over to Kaylee, sends a surge of her mother’s amplifying power through the telepath, “Again!”

Lynette makes a desperate noise when she’s grabbed, like a mouse in a trap. Small. Scared, even. She winces when he starts to squeeze. But. Gillian’s power reaches her and the effect is immediate. At least, for Lynette. Electricity pours out of her, coating her skin — shoulders included. But more than that, her hands move, gripping onto Knox’s arms and digging her fingers as far into his skin as she can manage before she focuses all that loose electricity forward, into him. Through.

Her eyes open. Arcs jump from them as well and — it’s hard to see through all the lights and flickers — but they seem to have whited over.

There is barely any time to react to There is no mistaking the sensation of having her ability amplified, her ability sharpens and becomes easier to use. The dull ache that the first attempt causes, bleeds away for the moment. When it hits, blue eyes first widen and then narrow with focus; with the only acknowledgement Lene getting is a quick nod of the telepath’s head.  Taking a deep breath, Kaylee unleashes her ability. She throws her hand out again —palm out towards Knox — while picturing the command, much like a spike.

«STOP DAMMIT!»

The command is driven home into the creatures skull — with a significant amount of mental force — in hopes of getting it to stop doing everything this it is, especially with what it is doing to Lynette. Her other hand lifts to join the other as she pushes another commend at the monster of a human being, giving her hand a small sweeping motion.  «We are not your enemy.» The telepath even tries to find a memory to reinforce this idea, even if it means glimpsing the horrors of its mind. Some things are worth the risk.

There's an apologetic look on Quinn's , but she knows well enough that now is not the time to be spouting those out. Instead she raises her her pistol and fire a few shots from her antiquated Smith and Wesson into "Knox" - her eyes aren't as blinded by the light, it seems. Still, her eyes widen at Lynette as, for a moment, it almost looks like she becomes electricity. As the snap, crackle, pop of electricity fills the air, audible over the music the earbud pumps into her skull, and she adds to it as she fires off two more bullets.

But, well, that's little to add in the face of electricity and telepath, so instead she turns her attention to Eve. "Come on, time t' get up, lazy bones!" she shouts as she tries to drag the brain dead individual off of her partner. Another mental note of bullets, 5 spent, and she swallows loud. At this rate she was going to have to switch to the P-90 and god help everyone when that happens.

“They've taken the passed and looped them back in. No peace. Just violence. Utter chaos. Tiny rips. Rip rip rip.” Eve shrieks as her bullet hits home and she bangs on the body she's laying on with a cry. The recoil knocks her shoulder back and she snickers. “Sorry Knoxy!” Is yelled out as Quinn rushes forward to help her up. “I resent being called lazy. All stoners do not just lay around on the couch. I don't even have a couch.” So there in your face Quinnie.

The display of Gillian’s ability through Lene makes the oracle swell with pride. Eyes flash in shock as Her Ladyship Lynette bursts into electricity. “Lady Zeus..” She whispers before nodding at Quinn. “Let's take this sucker down. He's no longer my friend. We have to set him free!” She yanks on the woman’s sleeve as she skirts up to Gillian pointing her gun at Knox ready. “He's not him anymore. Look at the eyes Gilly. I can't shoot now, I'm afraid I’ll hit her. Hole in Lady Zeus there and who knows.” Gripping the Desert Eagle tighter she holds, her aim stiff and precise. “Lady Zeus! Detach yourself and funnel those arcs into him!” Then she can give her support by shooting him. She would go for his legs when given the opportunity you.

All the noise and light makes it difficult to pay attention, but Gillian focuses everything on one thing— where her energy is going. That blonde, electrical goddess. More. More. She knows gestures and motions mean nothing to her power, but she pushes her hand up as if it would, flooding even more energy toward the lightning rod, pushing. Her assault rifle drops to the ground and she stumbles forward, reaching out.

Her hand latches onto Knox.

Another lightning effect begins to happen. This one's purple. Purple lightning flares up her hand and arms from where she touches him, flashes in her eyes. The glow increases and increases— more and more energy slams into Lynette. Even if it means she'll also electrocute the person giving her power. But she doesn't hang on long. Either way, she's been electrocuted before.
She can take it.
And she does.
Through the haze of gunfire popping in Knox’s direction, electricity leaps through Gillian and Knox together, grounds out onto the floor. Purple and blue bolts, a scream of “Mom, no!” echoing into the air from Lene’s direction. There’s panic and chaos, and Gillian is thrown by the electrical blast, toppling through three tables of Julien Dumont, flipping head over heels before toppling to the floor.

Knox, however, Knox explodes like a tree struck by lightning. Strips of flesh are torn away from his body like lightning-blasted bark, blood in his body is vaporized by the heat, and that gas pushes outward in whatever way it can. He explodes next to Lynette, throwing her back and onto the floor in a crashing heap. Blood, bone, muscle, and ashen cloth slap down to the ground in equal measure.

Lights overhead flicker, a few go out in a shower of sparks. Everyone’s ears are ringing, and for a moment, there is serenity in that whistling silence.

Jolene runs, boots slapping silent on concrete. She drops to her knees, skids into a slide next to Gillian, reaching out for her and then afraid to touch her all in one. Smoke issues up from Gillian’s body, her hair curled and singed, skin pink with burns. She mouths something, frightened, terrified. Tears well up in her eyes.

All is still.

Eve may call out to her, but it’s clear that Lynette does not hear her. She’s doing her best to fight off the monster, to push back against his hold on her, but it isn’t until Gillian makes her move that the tables clearly turn. As that extra boost pushes into her, an odd, crackling scream comes from the electrokinetic and there is a moment where she seems to flicker in and out like the lights above them.

But then.

Thrown back by the blast, Lynette leaves a lightning streak behind her and lands in a heap on the floor. Electricity shut off, she even returns to her normal self. Except one detail. Covered in viscera and ash, she doesn’t move from where she landed right away. It takes her time to stir. And even then, she only gets as far as propping her torso up off the ground.

When the thing explodes, Kaylee stumbles a little as the mind – deranged as it was — suddenly goes out, like a light switching out. Her whole-body shudders at the sensation as it is ripped away from her like that. She’ll never get use to that.

When Kaylee’s blue-eyes finally focus on the carnage around her, she gasps, “Gillian!”

Ignoring the gore, she hurries to the other woman’s side. Crouching down, she rests a reassuring hand on Lene’s shoulder, but doesn’t say anything. Instead, the telepath, does what she is good at… she checks to make sure that Gillian – and then Lynette – are still there. Maybe not awake, but at least – maybe – they are not dead.

The explosion pushes Quinn a half step back, but somehow she manages to keep her footing - possibly because she's too stunned to be knocked on her ass. The Irishwoman's eyes are wide as some of the viscera splashes her way, a hand quickly rising to cover her mouth - a motion borne more of shock than of any desire for protection or sanitation. A hurk sound follows, and immediately she's turning to the side, leaning over, and- well, she had a light breakfast anyway.

With that moment past, she pants, looking up and over at the others. "Oh- oh god," she whispers out, looking down to Gillian, and then to Lynette, and finally to Kaylee, surveying to make sure those closest were alive and fine.

It certainly doesn't look that way.

Swallowing, she runs over and slides down to her knees, hands flicking alight as she bathes both of them in a clean, white light, trying to elicit a reaction or otherwise at least see better. She gets to Lynette first, leaning forward and patting the other woman on the cheek, not caring about any stray electrical discharge. When Lynette sits up, she lets out an audible sigh of relief.

As Eve watches one friend explode into pieces she watches another one fly from the blast. “GILLIAN!” The raven haired woman screams and reaches a hand out towards her friend before she runs to Gilly at the same time as Lene. Sliding to her knees she sits on the other side of her best friend laying a hand on the wall right near Gillian hand hovering over her shoulder. Looking to Lene she looks desperate, “Have any healing in there Chicken?” Her eyes wide at the younger woman.

Muttering to herself she lets her hand hover and shake over Gillian's arm. Not touching but fully wanting too. Helpless but to watch and hope she survives this. “Gillian. Gillian wakey wakey.” She whispers near her friend's ear.

"Hrn."

That's a sound, right? Gillian comes too under the care of, well, many people, with her skin blistered and painful and suddenly wishing that she hadn't gotten the brilliant idea to hold onto a guy who was being electrocuted. Parts of her are burnt more than others where the lightning seared through her, and pieces of her clothing has melted slightly, but she's not dead.

That's a good thing.

"I'm good," she said, shuddering at the pain as she pushes herself through it, locking down the knot in the back of her head. She still has energy, but she nods toward her daughter, toward her friend. "I'm fine. Though I'm sure my hair has seen better days." And she hasn't seen the explosion that used to be the body of a friend yet— maybe it's better she doesn't look that way. "We need to keep moving." Even if everything hurts and she wants to lay down and take a long nap.

They all know that's not an option.

One hand on Gillian’s shoulder, Lene looks up to Eve and shakes her head slowly. “I— only have what’s around me. So, n-no.” There’s fright in her voice, anxiety in the tremor at which she speaks. But, her mother seems okay, okay enough at least to sit up, to be lifted to her feet. But the silence in the room, amid the sprawled and comatose bodies of Julien Dumont, is soon to be broken.

“Help!” A cry comes from through the double-doors Knox blew off their hinges. “For the love of God, someone fucking help! //Please!” A raspy old man’s voice cries out in the dark. What little light did function in this room was destroyed by Lynette’s electrokinetic overload. The computer is blown. Lights in all the adjoining halls are out. It looks like an entire circuit may be fried beyond repair.

“Please help!” The cry is a desperate one, fearful and panicked. Jolene offers a look to Eve, then her mother, and anxiously into the dark doorway and the hall beyond. She raises a hand, creating a globe of light in her palm using Quinn’s ability. Better to light the way, than wander into the dark.

A few stray jolts are all that Quinn gets, like static shock. Leftovers. Lynette looks over at her and nods once. “I’m okay,” she says, although she doesn’t sound it. Because she isn’t. She looks down at herself and her fingers pluck at a piece of her shirt to give herself a better view of it. “Oh god,” she says as it hits her — what just happened. Her attention jumps over to where Knox was and to what’s left. It’s hard to see, as only their own lights work. But she gets the idea. Or she remembers. “Oh god,” she says, more emphatically.

It is possible that she did not intend to explode anyone today.

She’s barely got her metaphorical feet under her when the screaming starts. It draws her away from the sight, from her own state, and she holds a hand out to Quinn. “Help me up?” she asks. “Gillian’s right, we need to keep moving. And I think we ought to move in that direction.”

Toward the screaming.

Rising to her feet slowly, Kaylee turns her attention to the direction of the door. Lips press into a line as she moves towards it. She makes a motion for the group to slow a little, “Let me…”

There is an understandable hesitation. She stops a short distance from the door, standing to one side a little, with her ‘borrowed’ rifle a little awkward in her hands. “No reason to go running through a door like a group of horror movies tweeny-boppers,” she offers them all a nervous smile to show she is not thinking of them like that… really. Especially not when you have someone who can work as a scouting party.

Slowly loosening her hold on her ability, the telepath seeks out ahead of her, looking for the source of the screams and anyone with malicious intent. Depending on what Kaylee finds, she’ll motion them to follow her and if the coast is clear, step through the door.

"Liar," is Quinn's response to Lynette, grinning as she reaches out to take Lynette's hand. Clasping tight, she helps pull the other woman up to her feet, before letting out a long, shaky sigh. "Oh God is right," she whispers in response to Lynette. "Number a' things I'll never forget's addin' up." With a look over to Eve, and then to Gillian and Lene, she takes a deep breath. "Yeah, normally I wouldn't be all for runnin' towards th' screamin'," but this is what they're here to do she reminds herself.

Like Jolene, she too forms a ball of light in the palm of her hand, releasing it to float alongside her like she had earlier. All the more light the better, as far as she was concerned. "I promise not t' blind anyone this time without much of a warnin'," she adds with a rueful smile as she raises her pistol and aims it down the hallway. "Any idea what it could be?" A person, obviously, but… then again… Quinn swallows. Shooting armed soldiers was one thing. Shooting whatever the fuck "Knox" was is another. "Better question is are we ready for more a' those things? Not sure how many times we can make Lynette here int' a battery."

At Lene’s admission that she had no such healing ability the raven haired woman simply nods her head and pats Lene’s arm and then Gillian is awakening and Eve is clapping her hands and nodding towards the other woman. “You are hard to take down Gilly. A real warrior goddess.” The action of walking up and placing your hands on a person that is being electrified adds weight to the statement.

As a scream for help pierces the air the seer’s head snaps up and she locks eyes with Lene before nodding as the younger woman begins to venture off with her ball of light. Helping Gillian to her feet before starting after the girl she tosses a comment over her shoulder, “Lightbombs are fun Quinnie.” Making a sound as she motions a explosion with her hands.

Stepping up to Kaylee she takes an defensive position Desert Eagle in hand. Ammo sits in her messenger bag of fun and her shotgun still has only been used a couple times. If there's a fight down there she's armed for it. Ready to move when Kaylee gets the go ahead. “Careful of the minds Miss Mind.”

"I've actually been electrocuted before," Gillian rasps in her hoarse way, rolling her shoulders as she tests to make sure she can stand on her own. When she confirms she can, she tests a few steps— it hurts, but she won't immediately fall over, so she carefully makes her way back to where she dropped the weapon she'd had— good thing too, too much metal would have made the experience even worse. She doesn't intend to go forward unarmed.

"Let's go find out if that voice belongs to someone we need to help…" Or someone they need to shoot in the face. Cause this place was supposed to be full of a lot of both, honestly, but she doesn't outright say the last as she makes sure her hands still work and stiffly tries to avoid looking anywhere that is covered with… well… what used to be Knox.

With that, she follow Kaylee's okay.

Kaylee finds terror, when she searches. Genuine, unbridled terror. There is a wave of panic that floods her mind, someone that feels that they’re trapped and if not rescued may die. It’s a genuine fear, though it isn’t all that Kaylee senses. There’s something else out there, beyond that darkened hallway, a tortured and agonized mind experiencing a sense of existential dread and agony that causes the telepath nausea. It’s not a trap, per se, but down that way is not safe.

It isn’t enough to warn Kaylee off though, and the pleading of that poor old man in the back of her mind is agonizing to imagine. With a subtle shake of her head, and a nod forward, she indicates the way as safe enough, and they begin a trepidatious march forward through the demolished doorway into the hospital corridor.

For Lynette, this is all too familiar.

She has been haunted by fleeting nightmares since April of last year, nightmares of hospital rooms, masked doctors, invasive surgeries and the cast-off husks of failed experiments. The events that transpired within Staten Island Hospital happened to her while heavily medicated, and she was not even conscious for her escape. But it would seem the ghost of that horrible place, of the inhuman experiments done there, may yet still linger in the halls of the Institute. There’s an unconscious nervous tic, a twitch one one of her brows and the corner of an eye.

It’s happening again.

On their way down the hall, blood stands out against the white walls and floor, in the sharp contrast of Quinn’s radiant power. Bodies, here, of Institute security teams. Shell casings line the floor, and their bodies are twisted and broken into unrecognizable shapes. Bloodied, bare footprints track back the way Kaylee and the others came from. This was Knox’s handiwork.

“Is someone there? Hello! Hello!?” The raspy voice of an old man is closer now, just past the demolished and crushed bodies. A steel door on the right side of the hall thumps with the impotent pounding of weak fists. A sign beside the door reads Exam Room A. “For the love of god, please let me out! Please! Please, god, I’m begging you don’t let me die in here!”

There’s no window to view inside. Kaylee can’t feel any minds in there other than the panicked old man. The door is barred, rather intentionally, by a P90 assault rifle jammed through the loop handle. Someone didn’t want this man getting out.

“Just go with it,” Lynette says to Quinn’s accusation, her lips curved into a hint of a smile. Amused, perhaps. But once she’s on her feet, her first order of business is to fix her hair. Electricity makes it a little wild. But when the group moves, she moves with them. That is, until they reach the hospital corridor.

She slows to a stop, letting the others pass her by as she stares down the hall. It isn’t the bodies or the blood that has her looking wide eyed. It’s the memories. She glances toward doorways, half expecting a certain, monstrous doctor to appear in one of them. They told her he died, but she didn’t see it herself. And deep down in the lizard part of her brain, he’s in every dark corner or shadowed doorway. Her hands clench into fists and she holds her breath as she follows behind the others. Chin held high. Jaw held tight.

As far as the man yelling, her gaze flicks to that door, to the sign and she looks over to Kaylee, a silent question hanging in the air. Is this a trap?

“I don’t feel anything too close, yet. However… ” The telepath’s eyes are unfocused as she stops before the barred door, feeling for mental impressions. When she glances back at the other, there are no words, she only holds up one finger, to indicate how many are in the room, and points to the barricaded room.  She was going to remove the makeshift door lock.

«Be ready guys.» Kaylee doesn’t want to warn the people on the other side, that they will  be met with force, if this sending a caution to the other women in her group. She shifts the P90 she has to her back and grasps the one lodged in the door. She almost pulls it right then, but decides standing right in front of it would be a bad idea. She moves to side a little, then gives the one holding the door a good tug, to pull it free.

Quinn's jaw clenches tight as she stands beside Lynette, looking to Kaylee, and then to Gillian and Lene. As Kaylee moves to one side, pulling the jammed-in rifle free, she stares at the door ahead of them with trepidation. "I should write a song about this," she murmurs. "It can be the dark, raucous one that finishes an album, the one everyone thinks is bizarre symbolism and not just abject horror," she asserts as she slips up to the other side of the door, a look offered up to Kaylee. She gives a nod - I'm going to open it, both it and her thoughts tell the telepath.

And so, she does. Standing a bit to the side, she reaches a hand up and starts to push the door open. She doesn't stand in front of it, in full view, just in case. Instead, she sends her hovering ball of light around the door frame and into the room - just in case she needs to detonate it. Assuming this guy isn't secretly Doctor Frankenstein come alive from the pages of the book Quinn always hated when she was growing up, she won’t need to. She hopes.

Hearing a scream for help again down the hall makes the raven haired woman tense as she stands near Gillian and Lene ready to shoot if prompted. Light gray eyes survey the hallway and she grins over towards Quinn the next moment, “Oh I'll co-write that with you if ya like. Put some banjos through distortion and..”

Trailing off as the women come to the barricaded door the oracle allows them to decide who opens the door. Eve’s gaze intent on the door she tilts her head to the side. A strand of of hair falls between her eyelashes. Light bounces off the two metal spikes stuck in her bun.

The feeling she has.. is one of cold mixed with darkness. Her brow furrows as she flints a gaze towards the power augmentor next to her.

"I'm thinking it should be something darkwave synth," Gillian mutters at the mention of a song being made about this place, cause all she can think is this needs to be a dark wave song. She's not a musician, but she knows what music would fit this mood. And in her head it's the stuff she used to listen to all the time when she dressed like a goth. The way the light flickers, the blood on the walls— it all looks like a horror movie— no— it is a horror movie.

Right down to the pleas for help from someone who could either actually need help, or— well. She'll reserve judgment. This place has certainly been known to kidnap and hold hostage innocents and good people.

"Stay behind me, Lene," she adds to her daughter as Quinn opens the door, despite the fact she's the one already actually injured. She's not even attempted to fix her bride of Frankenstein hair yet (complete with what might well be a white streak near her ear).

Lene protests, squares her shoulders, and takes her mother by the bicep and gently shifts her to the back. “Steady current,” she offers quietly to Gillian as Kaylee works the gun out of the door. “To me, constantly. It expands my radius. If I pick up a new ability, I'll know someone’s closing in.” Foot, down.

When Kaylee opens the door, there's a riotous clashing of metal inside the room. A wheeled cart is knocked over, followed by the clatter of forceps and clamps skittering across tile and out the door, followed by a frantic and severely injured man in his fifties. He's balding, and what little hair he has left is dark in swaths but mostly gray and curly. Most of his hair is matted down by blood seeping from a gash on the top of his head. His lab coat is stained dark with blood and not all of it looks like his.

“Jesus Christ thank fucking god!” The doctor exclaims, fingers wound into Kaylee’s sleeves as if she were a tall guardian angel come here to save him. He is, notably, shorter than her. But then, wife and panicked eyes see past Kaylee, past Lene, see Gillian.

“Stef?” Gillian can see the name tag on his jacket clearly. Doctor Elijah Carpenter. The memory copier. Former Moab inmate come — what? — Institute doctor?

“Darkwave synth?” Lynette echoes the words like she’s never heard them before. “Sounds like an Eighties movie about rogue AI,” she says, trying for a joke — for a whistle in the dark — but not quite hitting it. And it seems that she’s not keen on being a battery again so soon, because when the door starts to open, she lifts her gun to aim that way.

The doctor is just lucky that her people are close to him, because that’s about all that keeps her from shooting when she sees the coat and the name tag. And what that means.

“Hands off her,” she all but shouts as he grabs onto Kaylee and she lifts her gun to put a point on it when she adds, “or I’ll shoot them off.” She isn’t that good a shot, although the past year or so has given her a lot of practice. She can do some damage for sure. More importantly, she looks like she’s about to.

Kaylee is surprised when the little man grabs her arm, but she doesn’t extract it right away. There is no threat in his mind. The name on the tag, tickles at the back of her mind… she knows that name from somewhere. It is about the time she hears Lynette’s threat that it clicks.

She turns her body towards Lynette, eyes staying on the doctor; pulling one hand out of the man’s grip, she holds it up and makes a stopping motion. “Wait. Lynette. It’s okay. I know this name.” It was a faint memory of a conversation in the park. “Let’s give him a chance.” It would be nice to not have to kill everyone they come across. Her blue gaze, falls fully on Doc Carpenter, a small smile touches her lips – amused and reassuring as she says simply, “Jiminy Cricket says… hello.” It is a familiar nickname, for Kaylee’s big brother, that only to the man himself. “He told me that he’d like to see you freed from these people.” Those people being The Institute.

Even as she says those words, she listens to his thoughts, not completely a fool. Ready to act if he freaks out.

"Oh good. One of the Institute's doctors." Quinn's voice is flat, staring at the doctor as he grabs  at Kaylee's arm. The tone from Kaylee doesn't quite match she's expecting through, leading her to relax a bit. She doesn't train a gun on him, but she doesn't lower it all the way either. The ball of light dissipates from the air, Quinn taking a moment to form up another one.

She looks at him, studying him. "Alright," she can roll with this, "But we're going t' need t’ know what freak show plowed through here, an' if there's more of 'em," she remarks, turning slightly from the others to look around the room. The blood and chaos unnerve her, but she swallows it down as she sends her small ball of light roaming. Not far, in case it might catch anything's attention.

"And darkwave," she adds after a moment, sliding her eyes towards Lynette, "is a subgenre of synthwave and synthpop, usually wish a dash of something resembling industrial thrown in. Dark musical tones, sometimes dark lyrics. Very moody." Because she'll never pass up an opportunity for a music lesson. "I'll give you some music t' listen to when we get back t' the island."

There's a pause as the door is opened and the commotion is made to reveal the doctor. A doctor that Eve only knows in her dreams and the faint details that Gillian shared with the precog about her… torture. He and the other four have haunted Eve. His face lights a fire in the oracle’s belly.

The smell of oranges swarm Eve’s senses and her eyes go wide, the red light making it almost seem as if her eyes are that milk white they get when she is having a vision. Shaking her head from side to side she pounds her free fist into her thigh as she takes in the man’s face. “I’m looking in the wrong place,” her tone frantic as the look in her eyes.

The memory of her dream with Carpenter and the other doctors in that twisted horror house resonates through her as she pounds forward fast and moving to push anyone out of the way that she needed too. “The princess,” She cocks her Desert Eagle swinging it to point at the man’s temple, grabbing his blood splattered coat with a pale hand holding him at length.

An image of Doc standing in a laboratory on fire, a severed head held in liquid in a jar in his hands burns itself in the oracle’s mind. The head speaking and bubbles rising to the surface of the jar. Smoke strangling her lungs. “Is in another CASTLE!”

This man does not get too live.

She pulls the trigger a crazed look in her eyes mouth hanging open just slightly.

Gillian gasps at the sight of him, at the use of a name she never actually used, but one that could have been hers, would have been hers, should have been hers. But isn't, wasn't. She knows does recognize him, recognizes him from a time in her life that she'd rather forget, one that killed her in many ways… Her hand shakes at the sight of him.

He wasn't one of the doctors who hurt her the most, but he still had been there— he was still associated.

It still hurts to see him. The two blondes react first, but they don't react quite as… well… loudly and forcefully as Eve. "Eve— " she doesn't even finish what she might have been about to say. She's not even sure what it was going to have been as the gunshot drowns it out. She closes her eyes and looks away.

“We’ve gotta get out of here before — “ and then Elijah Carpenter is dead. Whatever warning he was tearfully trying to convey to Kaylee is lost when Eve pulls the trigger of her gun. There’s an explosion at the side of Doc Carpenter’s head, a spray of blood and bone against the wall beside Kaylee, and the doctor slouches into her arms and then his weight drags him to the floor.

Whatever secrets he had, whatever information he was trying to convey, those possibilities shrivel and die with a single choice.

Jolene lets out a shriek when the gun goes off, jumps nearly out of her skin and clasps one hand to her mouth. She hadn’t been prepared for that, was trying to scan his mind at the moment of his death, and she recoils with trembling limbs and ragged, hoarse noises of horror as she tries to reconcile the thoughts of a person who was alive one moment and dead the next. She falls back and away from Gillian, ears ringing, stomach turning in knots.

The sound of the gunshot echoes down the hall, and then is silent. A tinnitus ring hums in everyone’s ears, muffles the distant pop-snap-pop of gunfire from beyond the corridor. Muffles other noises in the dark. Wherever they are.

Lynette jumps at the noise, stepping back as the man’s head ends up a splatter on the wall. Her own gun lowers and she whips around to their shooter. “Telepaths, Eve,” she says and she steps forward again to put a hand on Kaylee’s back. There’s a look to Jolene at her shriek, a more sympathetic one. A worried one. But her attention turns back to Kaylee after a moment.

“Are you with us, Kaylee?” she asks, her tone quiet, especially given the ringing in all their ears in the wake of the gunshot. She may not totally understand what it’s like, being in someone’s mind as they suddenly die, but she can spot a trauma when she sees one.

When the gun goes off near her head, Kaylee can’t help but give a little shriek of fear and surprise, flinching away from the splatter of blood and grey matter against her face. Thank goodness the wall takes the brunt of the splatter. For a moment, what just happened doesn’t seem to register as she dumbly holds onto the slumping body, staring at the aftermath. Then it slowly dawns on her, about when the weight of Doc Carpenter tears him from her hands and he slouches to the ground.

“What…” Kaylee stares at the crumpled body of the man… The one she had just told they were there to rescue. “What did…. “A glances goes to Lynette, blue eyes wide, a trembling hand lifts to her own face to wipe at the blood and… and… that little flicker of thought has Kaylee’s whole body shutters and she looks visibly ill. She looks at Eve horrified, and takes several steps back, until her heels hit the fallen cart.

“This…. This is not what we are suppose to do. This is not who we are.” Blue eyes alight with fury as she turns the full weight of her gaze on Eve. “What. Did. You. DO. EVE?!” It is rare when the telepath gets this mad, her voice raising with each word. “There was no malice in his mind. He was just terrified.” Kaylee shudders again at the thought of the man’s mind going out and the feeling of the inside of his head splattering against her face. She lifts blood covered hands to ward off any answers from the Seer. “Don’t! Just — Don’t talk to me,” she chokes out.

She moves to push past the rest of them, looking like she wants to throw-up, searching for the cross hidden under her clothing with trembling fingers. “I came here to help people…” She can’t help but glance back at the body again, her head shaking, “I can’t… I…” She waves people away from her, heading quickly for the hall. “I think I am going to be sick.”

The gunshot, the resulting popped head, the unmistakable shriek from Jolene, the echoing silence - all of it has Quinn stumbling back and away from the group, eyes wide and a hand over her mouth. The sound of something catching in her throat is audible, before she suddenly turns around again and repeats what happened after Knox exploded. It's not a good day for keeping food down it seems. Where Kaylee threatens too, Quinn doesn't have the stomach not to.

Eyes wide and bracing herself against the wall, she shakes for a moment, before she turns around, eyes wide and anger painted across her face. "Eve!" she practically shrieks. "What the fuck is wrong with you?! We have a telepath, two, really! We have jobs! There would've been time for murder later, what the fuck?!" Time for murder later rolls off her tongue with some hesitation, but it's clear she's with Kaylee on this. She's breathing heavy, a hand gripping tight on to the crossbar of a gurney. She swallows loudly, still shaking a bit, ears ringing as a hand comes up to her forehead.

"I-" she watches Kaylee begin to pedal off, and she narrows her eyes at the seer. "I think you should hand off that gun t' someone else for a bit, Eve." There's an uncharacteristic sternness in Quinn's voice, but she's not moving to follow through on it herself. "Jesus fuck, we're supposed t' be gettin' people out! We're supposed t' be better than these fucks!" she continues on, turning back away with her hand still to her forehead.

"Merde," she curses again, low and under her breath. She's waiting for her breathing to slow a bit before she does anything else.

The splatter of blood and brain matter on Eve’s face and clothes is audible and the raven haired woman blinks as the body sags to the floor in Kaylee’s arms. Her expression cold but curious. She hears all the other ladies shrieking at her but she makes no move to answer. Her shoulders bunch up before she exhales a deep breath she was holding. Smoke trailing up to the ceiling from the barrel of the gun. Light gray eyes stare down at the body as Kaylee starts to walk away.

Flickers of the dream still flash across her mind, her fingers twitch as she closes her eyes and bows her head further.

“Fortis et Liber.”

The old PARIAH slogan is uttered as Eve moves to follow Kaylee into the hall. Her eyes staring ahead almost in a trance. She repeats the motto a few more times in a feverish whisper as she passes Lene. “I'm sorry Chicken. Didn't mean to spook your brain.” Is said softly to Gillian’s daughter as she continues to walk in the direction the blonde telepath is going. The oracle seems to only be half present. The reasoning behind her actions never said. She's just ready to move forward.

That whole experience was just— not one she wishes had happened. But it had happened too fast and too unexpected for anyone to stop. Gillian lets out a sigh, even if she, once again, feels like her head is ringing from the gunfire in too close of quarters. They should really start wearing ear protection on raids like this, they're all going to have hearing loss in five years. While Kaylee yells at her friend, she turns to look at her future daughter, putting a hand on the girl's arm and grimacing.

She wants to tell her it will be okay, but— well— it probably won't. They're all covered in blood and they're trapped in a horror story. She won't ask her friend why she did it, because— well, it's done. They've all seen worse. Yes, they're supposed to be better, but—

Will they ever be?

"No more of that, Eve, okay?" She won't berate her friend, but— well— she'll just ask her not to do that again.

Lene is furious. Her face is flushed red, her stomach is in knots, but she didn’t survive as long as she had in her time by picking fights at the wrong moment. Swallowing down that anger, incandescent as it is, she turns away from Eve and storms past the others further down the hall. “Let’s see if there’s anyone left here to save, and if not get to the extraction point.” Her boots clip-clap down the tile floor, and the sphere of light hovering in her hand has a sharpness to its glow, a hurt intensity.

With the others slowly filtering in behind her after Doc’s senseless death, Lene is the first to hear a distant sobbing sound from down the hall. Doors line either side of the corridor, none of which hold any minds within Kaylee’s delicate senses. There’s a moment of uncertainty, and Lene looks back to the others, then begins leading the way down the hall again.

The doors they pass by now hang open; demolished offices, papers strewn about the floor. Some are operating rooms with supplies scattered, tables upended, x-ray films pressed against tile flooring. The lights in here flicker and gutter, the power is still uneven from the lightning show Lynette put on. The sobbing sound comes nearer, a ragged and mournful noise, filled with a tremor of hopelessness and despair.

Lene draws in a sharp breath, stumbles to a stop, then steps aside so the others can see. Up ahead, crouched on the floor where the hallway comes to a T-junction, is a rail-thin old man with hawkish features and long, gray hair. His dress shirt is partly unbuttoned and rumpled, blood-stained hand prints are smudged over the fabric. He cradles something, tightly, between both hands. Doors nearby ping with — something — in Kaylee’s mind. There’s someone conscious in the four doors before the T-junction. She can also feel this doctor’s mind, and the waves of guilt emanating from his thoughts, which are entirely composed in German.

Again, Eve recognizes this man. He was in her dream, and he sits on one of the highest priority lists of the Ferrymen’s known Institute operatives. The Doctor Jonas Zimmerman, creator of the Formula, brainchild of the synthetic evolved. He’s openly weeping, tears streaming down his face, hands cupped around something tightly as he rocks back and forth.

Doctor Zimmerman doesn’t even look up when Lene shines her light on him. She freezes, tense, and looks back to Eve with an expression that can’t quite be sharp. She’s too torn by the mournful cry coming from the old man.

Being among the last to move, Lynette watches their backs as they follow Kaylee’s path. Her hand runs through her hair instead of keeping her weapon readied. But even she is a bit reluctant to use it after that. Even with the shudder down her spine that this place and these doctors give her. Given its state, that hair gets pulled up into a messy bun before she catches up to Lene and the others.

She hears the sobbing, sees the man, and while his cries don’t exactly bring sympathy, Lynette is a little concerned about a repeat performance. So she steps forward, tucking her gun away and putting herself between the group and Zimmerman. Let’s be honest, between Eve and Zimmerman.

“Doctor?” she says, attempting to get his attention, if cautiously.

Letting Lene take the lead with her glowing ball, Kaylee still looks sick to her stomach, but somehow manages not to go further then that. Fingers tight around the thin cross, she takes a few deep breaths and follows, keeping close to Lene.

“Guys…” comes out in a soft whisper, she snags Lene’s sleeve as a warning, before her arms going out to stall people behind her, fingers spread wide. A clear sign to stop. The feeling all the minds around them, has Kaylee nervous. Glancing to each side, she turns to Lynette, though the next mental thought drifts to each one. «Stop! I think… this could potentially be a trap.» She isn’t positive without digging deeper. Silently, the telepath points at the four doors where she can find the presence of others.

An anxious glance is tossed to Eve, before Kaylee takes a step to stands with Lynette, ready to stand with the council woman against another assault. The next words are spoken just loud enough for Lynette. “I’m going deeper… Watch my back.” With that Kaylee’s eyes unfocus as she stretches out her ability again and checks for threats, diving a little deeper.

Quinn stays close to Kaylee. She doesn't reach up to pat her on the back, knowing better than potentially startle someone given everything that's happened in the last several moments.

Instead, she keeps her own ball of light close, watching Lene as she takes point ahead of them. The mental warning gets her to stop though, a glance over at the others. Another glare is given in Eve's direction, before looking towards Kaylee.

Not sure what else to, she turns to Gillian. "What do you make of it," she asks the other woman, as if she might know. "This wh- whole horror show." Her voice hitches a bit as she thinks back to what Eve had done moments ago, and her stomach turns a little bit. "I don't really know much about the people we're lookin' for t' be honest. I just wanted t', like, help some people. But if things are like this down here…" do they deserve it is the implicit question. Was Eve right?

That thought also makes Quinn's stomach turn.

“I'm sorry Gilly, he was bad.” Eve whispers to her friend holding her messenger bag with the painting and other fun things close to her as she continues to walk. She makes a mental note to get Chicken a gift. The prophet takes the moments they walk the hallway stewing in her thoughts.

“The wrong castle…” she repeats this as they walk quietly to herself but over and over again. Sometimes she's aware of what she's doing and other times.. not so much. The oracle walks in silence cannon still in hand.

When the group comes upon the crying doctor Eve stiffens.

Her eyes widen, images of this very same doctor holding a bouquet of blue flowers, blood leaking from his mouth, flash through the seer’s mind strong enough for the telepaths of the area to be made aware if they cared to peek. Her pace falters and her knees grow weak. “Where are your flowers Jonas? The blue ones…” her brow furrows and she shakes her head confused, “All a different type… none the same…”

The hand with her gun shakes and she tightens her grip on her bag. She has not shot. This man was already dead in her dreams. Doc was a different story. She throws a wild look at Gillian and then Lene. “He is… he died here.” She sinks to her knees with a sad expression on her face blood still dripping. “He…”

"I'm sure he did bad things," Gillian mutters, probably too quiet for most of their ringing ears to pick up. She leaves out that she knows of at least one bad thing he did, and that she doesn't necessarily think he wanted to do them. She also, has done bad things. There's also people who would probably shoot her on sight. And honestly? She would not have blamed them one damn bit after all the death and destruction that has happened due to her ability.

Not that she would admit that, either. Maybe it made him bad. Maybe it didn't. Maybe they're just all degrees of good and bad.

At Quinn's question, she glances over and shakes her head. "I think we have to do what we decide is best at the time. Sounds like she had some kind of dream with him in it— and this one too. Her dreams are pretty horrifying at times."

"What do you see, Kaylee?" she asks the telepath, putting a hand on Eve's shoulder as the precog kneels down, trying to offer her comfort, offering the blonde a strand of energy to help make going deeper easier for her.

As Kaylee’s mind reaches out, scanning the adjacent rooms, the sound of Zimmerman’s ragged sobbing becomes more distant. She can sense the presence of others behind the doors, but there’s something strange and collected about it all, multiple minds all thinking the same thing. It’s like trying to read Brian’s mind, except the thoughts are an incoherent jumble of noise.

From Zimmerman, though, she gets something more cohesive, if not sobering. Images of Zimmerman’s daughters — identical triplets — wash through his mind, he’s trying to make them all he can think about. But there’s something else, something more. Kaylee edges past Lene, and the redhead takes a step forward with Kaylee to the T-intersection. The two scan the doctor, trying to see what’s behind his thoughts. There’s another woman, older, regal, and should Kaylee ever see Eve’s painting, she’d recognize her as one of the three witches depicted in it.

But Kaylee may never see that painting. Jolene doesn’t have the mastery of telepathy that Kaylee does, and her scans of Zimmerman’s surface thoughts return nothing. She edges closer, but Kaylee’s, Kaylee finds —

“Please forgive me for my sins,” Jonas murmurs, unclasping his hands.

“No!” Her scream is a terrified one, cracking the edges of her voice, and when Jonas lets go of what he was holding, a live grenade rolls between his sobbing form and Kaylee. Jolene’s eyes grow wide, she stares in abject horror and shoves Kaylee aside into the adjacent hallway with all her might.

Then the grenade goes off.

The entire hallway erupts in a tremendous explosion. Jolene is consumed by the blast, the shockwave knocks Quinn and Eve off of their feet. Eve’s gun flies from her hand, skids across the floor. Lynette is plowed into by Eve, knocked down onto her back, and drags Gillian with her. The noise is deafening, leaving a tinnitus ring in everyone’s ears and vision blurry.

As the shock of the explosion wears off, Lynette — the furthest from the front — is the first one to pull herself into a sitting position. Light sparks and gutters from Quinn, her ability working uncontrollably as the photokinetic swims between consciousness and unconsciousness. In the strobing light, there is gore everywhere.

Zimmerman’s lower body is a ruptured mess, scattered across the hallway, half of which has collapsed in on itself. There’s no sign of Kaylee anywhere, and live wires spark from the ceiling where the collapse happened.

Then, Lynette realizes some of the gore isn’t Zimmerman. There’s too many arms. Her eyes track, blearily, to tangled red hair and twisted flesh, meat pulled back from bone and shredded muscle. Jolene was ground-zero with Zimmerman.

As shock wracks Lynette, something even more confusing and horrifying happens. Jolene’s mangled torso sucks in a breath. She reaches up, gasping and pawing at what is left of her face, and then slowly begins to pull herself back together. Entrails tug the lower half of her body back to where the upper half is. Blood slithers back into open wounds, limbs graft themselves on to broken stumps.

After several gruesome moments, in which time Eve and the others start to sit up, Jolene has regenerated from the grenade blast, save for her shredded and blood-soaked clothing. Zimmerman, however, has no such ability.

At Kaylee’s mental instruction, Lynette does stop. And she gives the telepath a nod. She’s got her back. She lifts her hands, small sparks already jumping from her fingers. But before she can do anything to try to protect Kaylee, an explosion rocks her off her feet. She lets out a cry as she hits the ground, landing on previous wounds and leaving her head spinning. And her ears ringing. They had barely stopped ringing from the last loud noise. Her hand comes up to her face first and she pinches the bridge of her nose as if this might help.

It does not.

But she pulls herself up all the same, looking to the others first, counting heads in that pulsing light. Too few. She counts a second time before her gaze finds the gore. Eyes scan, noting who’s missing. Noting the arms. A shudder runs through her. She’s about to reach for Eve, to see if she’s okay, but the movement halts when things start to move in the bloody pile. She watches with wide eyes, moving herself out from under the others to get up to her feet. She’s not sure what is going to come out of that, and she wants to be ready. Even if her hands shake. Even if she’s starting to sweat. Even if a tear rolls down her cheek. She’s expecting the worst, watching body parts pull themselves back together. It’s not… a comforting sight.

Still, there is an audible sigh of relief when it’s Jolene that forms instead of some kind of horrible, mangled monster made up of spare parts. But. It’s probably clear the sight disturbed her, because she doesn’t come over to Jolene’s side to help her. Instead, she starts forward to look for Kaylee. To see if she missed her in the count.

“Kaylee?” she calls into the strobing hall. “Kaylee!”

Right as quiet starts to settle in the hallway….

WHUMP!

The sound of something hitting on one of the doors – warped and shrapnel riddled – which falls outside of the room it was blown into, leaving the gaping wide maw of the room wide open. The sound rings loud into the hallway; though after that explosion no one can hear it.

This time there is a voice that drifts out of the room, “Hello?!” There are those in the group that know that small feminine voice. There are a few more muffled words, as if someone talking to themselves…. But then it goes quiet.

Stumbling out of the room is a small blonde woman, her arm is bent weird and there is blood streaking down her face. She doesn’t really think much of it as she gives the arm a jerk, with a sickening pop as the shoulder is put back into place. Now free of her cell, the small woman, turns and gives the door on the ground an angry kick, heel of her foot contacting with the edge of it.  Frustrated with the turn of events, she is thinking about doing it again, when she catches movement out of the corner of her eye in time to see some redhead…. pulling(?!?) herself together.

“What the…. hell?” says Claire Bennet, softly.

There really isn't much for Robyn Quinn to do or say, simply laying where she has fallen with her eyes glazed over for a moment as she gurgles, motes of light rising off her body and then cascading back down into nothingness. Her little ball of light has vanished, the photokinetic no longer possessing focus to maintain it. Or really, anything else it seems like. As the light strobes through the room, her head turns slightly, "Elaine I wanna go home" spoken both barely intelligible and barely audible as she lies there - but at least it shows she's alive.

A hand clenched into a fist as everything rings around her. She's never wondered what it feels like to be caught by a grenade, but now she knows. She doesn't have the wherewithal to get moving yet, but she's working on it.

Maybe.

There's the unveiling of the grenade and there's no time for retreat and the next thing Eve knows her vision is spinning and so is her head. As her gun flies out of her hand she knocks her shoulder hard on one of the ladies and lets out a cry. Raven hair spilling half way out of her bun.

A groan can be heard or perhaps not from the oracle. “Oh Jonas..” she says aloud eyes landing on the doctor's former intact body. A crimson line forms on her arm where she has been cut by some flying debris. The blood drips to the floor. Her face now covered in black scoff marks and caked blood. Blink blink.. where is Kaylee..?

She coughs as she waves her hand in front of her face getting ready to crawl towards Gillian when she notices Lene’s condition and her eyes widen a hand goes to her mouth. As the shock of Lene seemingly being ripped apart and putting herself back together passes over her something tugs at the back of her brain. “See Chicken.. I knew you were a tough girl.” She coughs out. That is so uncanny.. she's seen a friend of hers do similar stuff before.. and Lene said she only has abilities that are around her..
The distant dull sound of commotion can be heard rumbling in Eve’s eardrums as she rubs the spot just under her ears owing in the process. And then Claire pops out of nowhere and the former PARIAH member blinks a few times at her former teammate and friend thinking it's an hallucination until she climbs on the side of the wall to pull herself up, screaming as she starts to run at her friend almost running into the wall because of the dizziness she's experiencing. Her shotgun jumping up and down as the woman staggers to her long lost friend.

“CLAIRE!!”

This whole time, all the horror, Gillian's been holding it together pretty well. Perhaps too well. A numbness having been over her since the dream revealed by Eve showed that there would likely be a lot of death in their future. She'd just moved to acceptance. The kind that was supposed to come after grief. Except she skipped all the other stages. Not exactly the best way to go about it. Even when she said goodbye to the Lighthouse Kids, she didn't allow herself the proper cry. For their sake, she told herself.

But then she's blown backwards. Then she sees… pieces of her daughter. "no. no no no." There's panic in her voice even before the girl starts to reform, starts to knit herself together. It shouldn't be possible. None of them have that ability, right? But it's happening and— she watches as tears finally fall down from her eyes. She watches as her daughter becomes whole once again.

And she scrambles over to her even before she hears the reason her daughter was able to become whole again. The reason that happens to be her cousin.

She wraps her arms around the now tattered clothed Jolene and sobs into her shoulder, "You're not allowed to leave me, you understand. Don't you ever do that again. Ever."

“I’m okay” Lene rasps into Gillian’s shoulder, to herself, to the room in absolute amazement. Her eyes are wide, body trembling, tacky with blood that isn’t hers. She looks back to where Zimmerman was, where dust and debris still hang in the air, and to the newly arrived woman with whom she has no familiarity. Drawing in a sharp breath, Jolene was about to ask a question when there’s a scream from the side of the T-junction that Kaylee didn’t disappear into, where rubble isn’t blocking the way.

It’s a blood-curdling scream, followed by a wet gurgling sound and yet another cry for help. But beyond that, there’s also a wild and howling scream. “Fuck you, you god-damned gibbering fucking turkey skin zombie bastards!” Then there’s a meaty snap sound, followed by another gurgling scream.

“You want a piece of us? Huh!?” Another gross crunch follows that bellowed cry. “Oh come on how many of you are there!?” Another crunch and snap, followed by a gurgling choking sound, and then six more crunching sounds.

Jolene is frozen at the noise, fingers curled into Gillian’s sleeves, eyes wide, trembling. Who could still be alive down here?

When Claire arrives on the scene, Lynette is back to counting body parts, trying to determine if Kaylee’s are among them. It’s the most horrifying game of hide-and-seek ever. But she’s trying. It’s Eve’s yell that brings her attention to the new arrival. “Eve, can you see if Quinn’s okay? I think… we lost Kaylee,” she says, her tone a little distant. Shock, maybe. We lost Kaylee is a nice, clean way of putting it, at least, instead of Kaylee got blown up so hard there’s nothing left of her.

Her head turns at the scream, looking down that junction with some trepidation. All the noises coming from there are, frankly, awful. But someone screaming obscenities means there’s someone down here alive. And maybe they’re in time to actually save them. Maybe it’ll make this experience… worth something.

So Lynette pulls her gun out. And runs toward the screaming.

“E… Eve?” The tiny blonde seems rather surprised to see the Seer there, well, only a little surprised. A hand goes out to steady her friend, while the other snags the barrel of the shotgun, and gently takes it from her. The shotgun is tucked into the crook of Claire’s arm, while she moves to half support – half hug her old friend. “What… What’s happening?” Brows furrow, glancing around at everyone.

The there is the scream that makes Claire about jump out of her skin. Invincible maybe, but even she can be startled by a jump-scare. She pivots on her foot to look down the hall, getting a good view of Lynette going kamikaze down the hallway towards the sounds.

A nervous glance goes to Eve, shotgun swung to see comfortably in her hand, she almost seems to be questioning if they should follow the crazy blonde – correction - the other crazy blonde.

"N-Nothin' good, that's what." Those words come with a groan from Quinn, the motes of light and strobing finally starting to fade away as awareness returns to her. Head leaned back against whatever is behind her - does it really matter what it is at this point? - she grimaces. "I'm pretty sure literally everything hurts now," she remarks, having no idea of what Jolene has just been through, or why Gillian seems so distraught.

It takes a bit of effort to pull herself up to her knees, taking a deep breath as Lynette runs off. "No, Lynette, don't. Don't run towards the screams." There's a distinct sarcasm to her voice, flat as she pulls herself to her feet. "Where's Kaylee," she mumbles, rubbing her eyes as she looks around the room, first to Claire, then to Jolene and Gillian. "Why is Kaylee short an’ not Kaylee, an' why does Jolene look like she's starrin' in Carrie?" Because jokes help, right?

Her palm lights up as she scans the floor for her Smith & Wesson, spotting it after a moment and retrieving it. "Are we- are we going t' go help her?" Yes is the obvious answer but nothing feels obvious at the moment.

“Hey! I mean it's obviously for your hands!” As Claire relieves Eve of her shotgun. A roguish grin thrown her friend’s way as she bends to search for her Desert Eagle finding it she checks the bullets reloading. The messenger bag lays limply on her shoulders as she digs inside and tosses extra shells towards the new blonde in the mix. “Her name is Beatrix and she's a real real bitch.”

She bends as she reloads her own firearm trying to shake the ringing from her ears. That's not exactly helpful, she still shouts. “This is a reunion! Knox was here.. they made him a.. I promise I'm not crazy a zombie! Bent him and broke him then glued him back together.” Eyes wide she grips one of Claire’s arms before what Lynette says belatedly replays in her head.

“QUINNIE!”

The raven haired woman momentarily leaves Claire to skid across the floor towards the other musician. Though Quinn has already gotten to her feet and has her firearm in hand Eve rushes over and leans in close to Quinn’s face. “Are you okay!?” She whispers (yells) directly at her.

The screaming and repeated sounds of someone having their body broken makes Eve’s eyes look that direction and watching Lynette run like a bat out of hell. She hops on one foot and slams it on the floor. “Ladies! Daughters! Let's help Lady Zeus and Miss Mind!” She gives Gillian and the others a look before running forward nudging Quinnie and grabbing Claire’s shoulder.

“Tally HO!!”

There’s a wild Eve rolling down the hall.

If she could pay attention to anything besides making sure her daughter is actually in one piece Gillian might be more concerned about things like missing Kaylees and the crunching sounds she's hearing. But first she's giving Jolene probably the most thorough quick-check over she's ever had since she was six years old and fell out of a tree. And her mom doesn't even remember doing it originally.

But she does it now, and almost exactly the same as she did it back then. Just faster.

"Yeah— you're okay," she says with quiet relief, still with tears in her eyes and that hint of 'don't you ever do that to me again' before she starts to process other things. Like a missing Kaylee. And suddenly Claire. "Hey Claire. You have no idea how happy I am that you are here. I could kiss you." And she actually means it cause if the girl hadn't been in the general vicinity— well— she'd be short a future daughter.

"Right— we should find Kaylee." She vaguely remembers having been sending energy to Kaylee, but she lost track of that when she watched her daughter get blown to bits so she doesn't know much of what happened after that. "I don't want to explain to Joseph that we lost her," she mutters, wiping her tears, though mostly just proceeds to smear blood on her face. Blood from too many freaking sources.

"Claire, Jolene. Jolene. Claire. When we get out of here, I'll properly introduce you two." Cause right now might not be the time to go by the way this is your cousin from the future. She goes to retrieve her rifle before she gets left behind by a wild Eve.

“Kaylee’s a floor below us,” Jolene offers with a furrow of her brows. “I can feel her mind down there, she’s just on the edge of my ability. The stairs are blocked,” green eyes flick to the debris, “We’ll have to find another way d —” Lynette is running off. “Lynette!”

Grabbing Gillian’s hand, Jolene runs after Lynette, dragging her mother with her. On the way past, she bumps her shoulder gently into Quinn, as if to say this way. Claire and Eve are left to their own devices, they seem both the least shell-shocked and the most capable of continuing on their own.

Now at the head of the group, Lynette treads through Doctor Zimmerman’s remains and turns the corner, following a blood-streaked and dimly lit corridor. Jolene and Gillian are the closest behind, but Lynette’s adrenaline-fueled sprint has put her a long pace ahead. The lights here are still flickering and guttering from the damage to the power grid, but the blood isn’t from the explosion. It looks like arterial spray from… someone. But there’s no body to be found. Open examination room doors line the hall, as well as an ACTS unit in the middle of the hallway that looks to have been axed open. The container’s lid is notched with indents and its lock has been brutally broken off. Whoever was inside left damp, bare footprints on the tile floor in the direction of —

“Motherfuckers!” Comes a scream from behind a pair of double doors to Lynette’s right. “Come on! Come on!” Then a meaty snap, followed by a gurgling scream. Pushing through the doors —

“Lynette nooo,” Lene interjects —

— Lynette emerges in a laboratory. Shelves are toppled over, broken glass litters the floor and damage lab equipment is scattered amid the glass debris. There are seven naked bodies laying on the floor, each chopped apart by some sort of cleaving trauma. All of them the same man, Julien Dumont, the replicator who had copies back in the first room of the medical wing.

Worse, though, are the nine naked copies of Julien Dumont in the room standing in a half circle, their bare backs to Lynette. Each one of them has something gripped in their hands — a chair, a scalpel, a lamp, and so on — and each of them are lunging at a pair of people pinned in a corner of the laboratory. One of them is a dark-haired woman in her thirties carrying a fire extinguisher, the other is a man of roughly the same age with a lantern jaw and scrubby brown hair wielding a bloody fire axe.

Lynette doesn’t know Tyler and Libby Case, so the revelation is lost on her.

“Oh!” Tyler calls out when he sees Lynette, “Hi there!” He plants an axe square in the head of one of the Juliens, sending it crumpling to the floor with a ragged scream. “Hey so— if you’re not here to put me back in a cell, could you maybe — “ Tyler leaps back from one of the lunging Dumont clones. “You know— help?” He lunges back in, planting the axe into the man’s chest.

Lynette runs like she doesn’t hear anyone calling after her. And maybe she doesn’t. She needs a win today, guys. Just one. And so she follows the voice through body parts, through blood and finally, through doors. She comes to a stop at the bodies — the dead ones — and then looks up at the voice when he addresses her.

She’s covered in blood, in ash, in god knows what else. And she seems to think this makes it obvious that she’s not here to put him back in a cell. There’s time for a brief lift of an eyebrow before she runs forward. She grabs hold of two Juliens, loosing her power into two of them. Walking Electric Chair, her father used to joke. It’s less of a joke in times like these.

“You look like you’re holding your own,” she notes with a glance toward the copy with an axe wound through the head. Her gaze shifts as he buries it in one’s chest next, but neither seem to shake her at this very moment. It’s been a day.

Letting go of her two Juliens, she reaches for a third.

Making sure that Eve is steady first, a quick check going to make sure the shotgun is ready, Claire hurries after the others. The voices in the room have her moving a little faster, one voice familiar…. but is it him or…? This isn’t a thought that the former cheerleader lets herself think about. Whoever, it is her friend or Tyler Case.

Before she enters the door, Claire brings up the shotgun, resting the butt of it firmly against her shoulder. Eyes narrow as she slips through the door, expression falling into that emptiness of a huntress seeking prey. Those flat eyes, sweep the room as she steps in and …. Whoa!

Nothing will shake you out of your concentration like the sight of a…. okay. The shotgun dips down briefly in her surprise, but only until she sees Tyler Case beyond all that naked skin. It shakes her out of her shock and she is taking aim again at the bodies without any clothing. Cutting across the floor, turning back into a mini killing machine, Claire tries to keep her friends out of the spray of the ammo as she fires off several shot, trying to take out what Juliens she can safely.

"Yes, please, Eve. Yell in my ear, I can't hear you over the ringing." Quinn's expression and tone are both still very flat, almost evoking the image of a sarcastic teenager, watching as the precog runs off after Lynette. "I might shoot her myself when this is over," she grumbles, eyes sliding over to look at Gillian and Jolene. Murder isn't Quinn's thing, but she's been put in a mood today. A glance is offered to Claire - there's something familiar about the other woman, particularly once she hears her name again, but there's only one thing that matters to her. "Claire's a weird way t' say Kaylee," she grumbles, trying not to crack a smile at her own joke. She's not entirely successful, the corners up her mouth tilting up just a slight bit.

But, well, Jolene has made it clear what to do, and that does, in fact, mean running towards the screaming, something Quinn herself had advised them to do earlier. Turnabout is fair play, it seems. She is quick to follow, pistol raised and as much focus as she can draw back up in her eyes. It's when she comes into the laboratory, comes across Lynette, Claire, the others, that she comes to a skidding store again. Naked men aren't her thing, particularly ones resembling movie monsters. And there's people in need of help.

This is what she's here for. Context clues - the yelling, the axe, everything else - tell her what she needs to do. Summoning up all the strength she can, she raises up her pistol and squeezes off three shots into one of the identical men. This might normally come with more hesitation, with more queasiness. But after everything else she's seen in the fifteen minutes? Fuck it. She's seen worse. Two shots left she tells herself, taking a deep breath, looking down to see if she even has anymore ammo for the handgun.

"I swear t’ God y’ better not have any grenades or pissed off the crazy lady with th’ big pistol," she remarks. "I'd like t' get out of here with some folks alive."

There are a number of things that run through the raven haired woman’s mind as she races with the others towards where Lynette has gone with all the sounds of death and gore ringing out from the door. One, Eve wishes she had taken that flame thrower off of Monty’s hands back in 09. And two, how she should have had a snack before starting this raid because she is feeling a bit hungry. Patting her belly with her free hand, “Shut up you or they’ll hear us.”

As the group slides into the laboratory the oracle's eyes go wide and she whistles as she takes in the backside of the Juliens. The faces of Tyler and Libby case come into her field of view and she stops, head tilting a warped and watered down memory swims across her mind. “That's.. He stole his face..” her eyes close for a moment as gets confused. He's not Richard but he was Richard??. “I.. I..” Eve shakes her head as her Desert Eagle is hefted up and pointed in front of her. Her eyes wild she smiles brightly showing white teeth in the red light, “Bang.” Before she fires she pivots and a series of bullets are shot at the replicator coming in closest to Tyler and his sister hoping to hit him in the chest and his head. “Go for the brain guys!” She shrieks and is.. she..

Lady Zeus and others are doing their thing and Eve arches an eyebrow as she holsters her Desert Eagle and closes her eyes for a moment.

Just keep swimming, just keep swimming.

Light gray eyes snap open and she opens her mouth in a cry. Charging forward to the nearest Julien the crazy woman leaps pulling out both metal spikes from her hair as she does so. Long midnight black hair flies in the wind as does her dress, she aims for the back of the clone. Wrapping legs around his waist she plunges the spikes in both sides of the man’s neck, “BONZAI!!!!!!” Eyes wild and in a frenzy Eve does something maybe not expected when she leans over the clone’s back and bites into his face. Spitting out whatever she’s tore away to the ground.

There will be blood, lots of blood.

If her daughter feels well enough to pull her down the hallway after the electric woman, then Gillian will feel well enough to follow, though she's not sure she's quite ready for what she sees. What is it with clone ass? would be her first thought when she sees what's going on in the room, until her eyes settle on—

Two faces she hasn't seen for a very, very long time. Innocent bystanders sort of?, even if the red lightning had caused quite a lot of harm in the past and present. "Holy shit." It's Tyler Case. "He's a friend, Eve." Or she thinks he is? Maybe. Could be. Should be? Will be? They'll figure it out but they didn't need her shooting people anymore.

Except the naked peoples, at least, which she seems to be focusing on, thankfully. A purple glow starts to come to her eyes as she reaches out with her ability, sending out energy once again to those who might need it.

They don't need more guns going off in this close of range, so she just settles with being a battery pack.

Riots of gunshots, screams, biting, gnashing, and chaos is witnessed in skip-level illumination, between the flickering strobe of photokinetic light wavering between bodies, to the arcing crackle of electricity. It is like a gory fever dream brought to life.

Electricity arc, snaps, pops and blasts bodies apart. The smell of burned hair and skin floods the laboratory and the electrical discharge blows out the remaining lights. Showers of sparks rain down from the ceiling, and in that flickering blue-lit maelstrom, Tyler Case wildly dismembers copies of Julien Dumont with a fire axe. Behind him, his sister Libby brandishes her fire-extinguisher, smashing it against any of the clones who get too close.

At the end, when the chaos has finally subsided, Jolene stands with a wet film of blood and gore plastered to one side of her face. Chunks of meat and hair fall from Tyler’s axe, and he looks up at the people who came to his rescue with mixtures of surprise and uncertainty. There’s more familiar faces than not, and as he stands up straight and hefts his axe over his shoulder, Tyler seems — remarkably fine with all of this.

“Wow, this is weird, right?” Tyler offers with a crooked smile, eliciting a look from Libby that is both scathing and dubious. Tyler eyes her side-long, as a chunk of Dumont plaps off of the head of his axe. “So, anyway,” his weight shifts to one foot, hand on his hip. “Yeah, weird, right? Us, together, here?” He swings the axe around, motioning to the rest of the room.

“Anyway, uh, I’m Tyler,” he affords to those who aren’t familiar, “and this here is my lovely sister Libby. Libby this is uh, Eve? Eclair, uh… you know, her? Gwen, uh…” Tyler’s brows furrow, “Sparktacus, uh…” his voice upticks at the end. “R-Redhead, and others.” A wavering smile flits across his lips, and Libby rests one hand on Tyler’s shoulder and looks to everyone else.

“Tyler’s— we need help.” Libby looks over to Gillian, recognizing her only. “The Institute’s had us down here for a long time, they— kept me and Tyler in this… I don’t even know, duplex apartment?” Her eyes narrow, brows furrow, and the logic is just not there. “It was like, a really nice— no. No, focus.” Libby looks to Tyler, who is prodding a Dumont clone with the spike end of his axe.

“Have you seen Doc?” Oh no. “Elijah, he was a Moab inmate. The doctors here had him forcibly copying consciousness’ around. He— copied Tyler’s into a clone of Julien Dumont, had some doctor change his face to look like himself.” Libby grimaces, anxiously. “When the— whatever the hell is happening, started, Doc came to us and broke us out of our gilded cage. He said something about Julien’s clones and Tyler, said we needed to find Doctor Zimmerman…”

Libby carefully wraps an arm around Tyler’s shoulder and urges him away from the corpses.

“We found Director Broome, he was… he was destroying the labs. He’d done something to the root Julien, I think he was trying to destroy all the Institute’s work. Doc said we had to get Zimmerman and get to the root Julien, whatever the hell that is…” Tyler looks up to her with a huge, dopey smile. “I— “ Libby tenses, looking back to Gillian. “These Dumont clones started attacking everyone, Doc ran off to get help, and then… someone opened all of the containment cells for research. I— I don’t know what to do, but Tyler is connected to Julien.”

“If— if you’re here to help,” which Libby can only presume Gillian is, “we’re… we need it.”

Jolene has been pacing around since Libby started talking, anxiously looking to Tyler, then back to the others. She pulls off her shredded jacket and uses it to wipe her face clean, then discreetly pulls Lynette aside. “I know this kind of replication,” Lene whispers, offering a side-long look to Gillian. “One central replicator, subservient clones. What we saw in the other room, I think they’re harvesting his clones, and if this ‘Doc’ can copy consciousness, then…”

Lene’s tense, then furrows her brows. “Worse, if something happens to the root Dumont, it could affect other people who’ve been copied into those bodies. We— need to be careful with this.” Lene eyes Gillian, then looks back to Lynette. Trusting her with this conversation says a lot about how Jolene sees the electrokinetic.

“Lynette,” the electrokinetic corrects. Because Sparktacus is not a thing she’s going to let live a long life. Especially not today. (But let’s be real, not any day.) While the Cases start to explain things, Lynette shifts a Julien away from her with a foot, but only until there’s a lull where she can add, “They’re dead.” It is not the kindest way to deliver the news, but there it is.

“Everyone behind us is dead, actually. Or brain dead. But we are here to help. We’re trying to rescue as many people as we can. So. Consider yourselves part of that.” She looks to the group, lingering a little longer on Eve than the others, just making sure this is cool with everyone. Or understood, in some cases.

She gives a nod to the Cases as she’s pulled aside and turns her attention to Lene. She leans in a bit, to catch the whispers from the girl. Her volume drops to match. “They drop a mind in a clone, shift it to look like whoever they want, and… what, live forever?” It isn’t a terrible plan, exactly. But not a great one, either. Her eyebrow lifts as Jolene goes on and she casts a glance to Gillian, too. Just briefly. “So, the original dies, maybe they all die. And we don’t know who all they are. So we keep the original alive. If we can find him.” They have holding cells on the island, after all. Might be time to fill one. A thought occurs to her, though, and she runs a hand over her face. “Are they… linked? Does one know what they all know? Is there a chance that might be the case?”

Now that everything is dead, Claire is able to really get a look at Tyler, stepping closer to get a look at those eyes. Eyes can often tell you something about the person behind them. Her brows lower a little in confusion, maybe there is a bit of disappointment that it wasn’t her friend behind those features. She remembers conversations with the present day Cardinal, which prompts her to say, “Of course, we’ll help….” or at least… she’ll help. Her father might be a councilman of the Ferrymen, but she is not associated with them. She’ll go her own damn way if need be to save a cute… er… I mean Richard’s friend.

Shouldering the shotgun, Claire reaches out with her free - probably blood splattered - hand to touch Tyler’s arm lightly; she even offers him a gentle smile, one that reaches her eyes. A little glimmer of the old Claire. “Richard will be really happy to see you again.” She feels confident in this.

The smile slowly slides away as she looks to the woman next to him, hand falling away from Tyler’s arm. “Did you get any idea of where the original Julian is?” She asks this of Libby, after Lynette asks her questions. “Or at least a direction to go? This place is huge.” She should know, even though she has only been in this part of the ark, it was big enough on its own.

Richard catches Quinn's ears, causing her to glance over at Claire. The only Richard she knows is one she's had a few arguments with in the past, usually at the fault of one Magnes Varlane. There's a lot of Richards in the world, but they all seem to walk the same circles these days. But, for now, she tucks that away.

"This place is huge an' easy t' get lost in." A look is offered back to Lynette, Quinn's lips thinning. "I'm sure you've heard all the explosions, gunshots? Yeah. They're dead." The photokinetic's expression is still flat. "Not f'r lack of wantin' otherwise, though." She glances over at Jolene and Lynette, before looking back at the Cases. "Tyler an' Libby, eh?" The names are familiar. She thinks she's heard something about them before but she can't focus enough to pull it up at the moment. "Robyn Quinn, nice t' meet you an' all that."

She turns her palm up and solidifies herself another ball of light - that, at least, she can focus on right now, and Gillian’s influence makes it shine even brighter than normal. "Just keep an eye out f'r Eve, she’s feelin' a bit trigger happy t’day," Quinn remarks very matter of factly, moving past Claire. "So, okay. This Dumont guy, if he's down here too… Well. I reckon we're here t' save as many people as we can, so lets get to it." There time, she's going to try and take lead while the others discuss things.

Robyn Quinn is not doing it to feel heroic, though. She just wants this done.

The thrill of taking down bad guys is intoxicating, it's liberating and full of majesty it is.. quite bitter actually. Eve knows this as she spits out more of the clone’s skin and blood from her mouth wrinkling her nose. Coughing she wipes her mouth. That did not taste good. With blood dripping from her lips she looks sheepishly up at Tyler and his sister. “Yes that's me!” She says with a wave of her hand to his questioning of the people around them. A few sprays of blood might fly Quinn’s way. As she speaks she yanks both metal spikes out of the downed replicator’s body blood jetting out onto her boots. “Goddamn it. My favorite boots.” She mutters.

But as the news is spread of how everyone is dead Eve gets unusually interested in a bunch of desks in the corner. Whistling she picks through what lays on the desk.

Who me? Nothing to see here.

Blood speckled midnight black hair falls into her equally blood splattered face. Sparktacus is given a rather loud snort and Eve holds onto the edge of the desk shaking from laughter. As the group talks of the root and how they can't find it Eve wants to chime in but she can't help that Lynette’s new nickname is so hilarious. The oracle's eyes go wide as her foot finds a puddle of Julien’s blood and her legs fly into the air!

SPLAT!

“I'm okay! ..but someone should grab a mop maybe.”

“Ooh a Snickers!”

“..Quinnie! You wanna bite?”

Eve’s hunger is satisfied.

While others (Eve) are enjoying taking down the bad guys, Gillian finds herself considering all the things that have just been revealed. Huge, terrible things.

The Institute has been using Doc to mind-swap people into clone bodies and then changing their appearances to replace them in the real world. Why yes, of course they are. Of fucking course.
"So literally anyone could be a face-changed clone." Gillian ponders the possibilities. They could have taken over high reaches of government, they could have infiltrated the Ferry. Even Evolved could have been replaced with the Tyler Case red lightning power on their hands. "And if we kill the original, they could all die." How many innocents would die at the expense?

Eve earns a quick look, before she shakes her head. Her friend is crazy, and has proven her crazy is definitely not the safe kind. "We are here to help," she does clarify to Libby, though Lynette has already done so— she wanted to add it since Libby seems to remember her. From about as terrible of a time. And at least they will actually get to help two people.

"We have to find the root first, then we can… figure out what to do with him. If only Kaylee were still here…" She can't think of anything. She knows the telepath could maybe do something. "Do— do you still have your ability at all?" She asks after some hesitation, to Tyler.

Tyler scrubs one hand at the back of his neck, axe still over his shoulder. “Ah, no. No that— that’s long gone. I’ve just got Sweetpea here— “

“Do not name your axe,” Libby interjects, a hand on Tyler’s shoulder. “Please.”

“I’ve got this axe here,” Tyler corrects, “and it’s red, so I mean. That’s something, right?” Libby looks to the others as Tyler says that, brows scrunching up in a it can’t be helped expression. “Look, ah, ok. So— Doc’s dead?” One of Tyler’s brows raise, and he looks down to the bodies on the floor and smashed medical equipment. “Ok, so… so plan B.”

At that, Tyler just starts walking. Libby, startled by the movement, hustles behind Tyler and takes his arm. “W-Wait! Wait, Ty. Hold on.” Her eyes sweep back to the others, then back to her brother. “Hold on, let’s— let’s come up with a plan. Maybe we can find, uh, Kaylee?” She looks back to Gillian with a helpless expression.

Smiling, Tyler lays a hand on one of Libby’s. “Ok, ok.” He smiles, wearily. “I mean, we’re not in a rush.”

«WARNING: REACTOR AT NEAR-CRITICAL LEVELS.»

“Well,” Tyler wrinkles his nose. “That’s spooky.” The automated voice of the arcology’s emergency alert system and pops over the lab’s loudspeakers over every other sound. Libby looks at Tyler, wide-eyed. “Sorry, Sis. We can’t let this t’chance, you know?”

<BEGIN EMERGENCY EVACUATION PROTOCOLS»

“Tyler, no!” Libby shrieks, and Jolene swiftly moves up to Libby’s side, resting a hand on her shoulder.

“Hey,” Lene calls ahead, and Tyler stops, looking over his shoulder with a waggle of his axe. “What— what’s Plan-B? Why— what was Plan-A?” Brows raised, Tyler inclines his head to Jolene, then briefly looks to the others.

“Well, find Doc, get my brain into— literally anyone else. Then axe the Root a question.” Tyler’s lips purse to the side, swinging his axe off of his shoulder into both hands. “Now, it’s just the axe part, really.” Tears well up in Libby’s eyes as Tyler is instantly committed to the act.

Jolene, lump in her throat, looks back to Gillian, then to Tyler. “Is— isn’t there— are you all linked? L-Lynette,” not Sparktacus, “she asked you if— “

“We’re not, but. I mean, physiologically we are. High up muckety-mucks in the Institute’ve been using these clones to avoid getting killed. People like Broome. Plus, Julien got kinda’ womby.” Tyler shrugs one shoulder, grimacing. “It’s gotta be done. You kids don’t have to stick around if you don’t want to. I can… you know, take care of it myself. Either way, I’m not really expecting to go golfing after this.”
Tears rolling down her cheeks, Libby swipes a hand below each eye and retains her adamant grip on Tyler’s arm. “I’m going with you,” she asserts, still holding on to the dented fire-extinguisher in her free hand. Tyler manages a half-smile at that, and looks back to the others.

“You all in a suicide pact?” Tyler asks casually. “Cause I mean, if not, you might wanna boogie. But if you’re up for some high intensity cardio, there’s about a hundred more Julien clones between me and —” Tyler slaps a hand on his forehead. “Oh, right. The virus thing.”

At that, Jolene’s head quirks to the side and her expression shifts from worry to dread. Tyler half-turns back to the room. “Doc was saying Zimmerman was experimenting on something called the Advent Virus. Was worried that if this place went up in smoke that it might get released to the populace. Most of his experiments were done in the same place Julien is locked up in.” Tyler eyes Libby. “Sorry, you were— scream-vomiting when we were talking about that.”

One brow raised, Tyler hefts his axe over his shoulder again. “So… is this a party, or?”

Plan A, Plan B, Lynette doesn’t seem to be dedicated to either. In fact, there’s not much of a reaction out of her until the warning comes right on the heels of Tyler saying one of those things you just don’t say. What else could go wrong. Maybe it’ll be fine this time. We’re not in a rush. Her eyes close on a long-suffering sigh because it is all she can manage right now. Probably because she’s in shock and refusing to process just… anything.

“There’s an alternative,” Lynette says, “If we can get the root out, we have a place to stash him. So we don’t make any rash decisions.” There have been a few made today. Rash decisions.

When they remember to bring up the virus, Lynette flicks her attention between brother and sister for a moment, then settles on Tyler at his last question. “Has anyone ever told you,” she says dryly, “that you’re a touch obnoxious?” But, it’s a rhetorical question, because she turns back to her group — Claire included now, apparently. “I’m going. Seems like there’s a few Ts to cross and Is to dot. It would definitely be safer for you to get to the extraction point. And you’re free to do so. But anyone who’s coming, let’s do.”

Then she turns back to the Cases, ushering Tyler forward with a flourish of her hand. “Lead the way.”

“Hell yeah it’s a party,” Claire says with a rather confident smirk, eyes hooded with determination. To the Case siblings and those that do not know her, she might look like an average young lady just starting out her adult life, but behind it all is someone who has seen too much and done more, than someone like her should have had, too. “I’ve been cooped up far too long,” she says with feminine growl, “I think I’m ready to see if I have lost any of my touch. Let me take the lead.”

With the shotgun still resting on her shoulder, she turns and glances at Eve, motioning her to follow. “Got a knife in that pack yours?” Claire is pretty confident the seer has one, so she holds out a hand as she walks.

There is a soft chuckle as she passes Lynette, saying softly, “I dunno. I think he’s kinda charming.” Her brows lift a bit with a shrug and she is stepping out of the door, hopefully, with Eve in tow. A part of her feels like she hasn’t felt this alive since Madagascar. At least this time she isn’t pieced out into jars on some scientist’s shelf. Still the same life and death scenario though.

Quinn is just kind of silent as she stares at Libby and Tyler. then over at Lynette. Ejecting the clip out of her hand gun, she draws up another - she's running low, but that's what the P90 is for. Viruses, roots, death - potentially mass - all drifts through in the moment as she stands there, adjusting the bag she has strapped across her frame that contains Else's music. Her gaze doesn't leave the Cases as Lynette speaks, and when she does, a small smile forms on Quinn's face.

"I came here t' make sure that people get out alive," she remarks, turning away from the Cases as following after Lynette. "Why don't you stay your asses here so y' don't die while we're tryin' t' do this," she tells them, racking the slide on her pistol. "Seen enough a' that t'day," she says in a bit lower voice.

As the talk of what is assuredly a suicide mission continues, she offers a smile, reaching up to her ear. There’s no earbud waiting for her though, much to her dismay - most likely it was disintegrated in the grenade blast. Which leaves Quinn momentarily gutted - what better time for incredible music blasting into her ears! But oh well. She could do without.

She falls in step behind Lynette as she pushes Tyler forward, a bit of a frown on her face - she'd prefer directions be given at a distance, but… well. Today has been a wreck, even as she thinks back to what she left to come here, she swallows. "I mean, all I can do once we have these things chokin' down on us is shoot, but-"

Her brow stitches together. She thinks back, to a conversation she had over a year ago. "Well. There might somethin' I can try if we need t', I guess, if it gets bad enough." There's not a ton of of confidence in her voice but… carpe diem.

Or in simpler terms, fuck it.

The seer pops to her feet mouth working as she chews her candy bar. Another one found and in her hand she wears a feral grin as she grins towards the group while the sirens go off.

“I haven't had one of these in years!” Eve bites off another healthy bit of the unopened candy bar and tiptoes over to the girls and dude. “So, we need to not kill the original and we also need to not die.” Chewing fiercely on the candy bar she puts a dirty arm on Gillian’s shoulder leveling Claire with a look, Claire knows that look. The two have gone on way too many runs and missions for her not to know that look. “What do you think this is amateur hour?” Eve cackles and looks over to Lene as she digs in her messenger bag. “I'm sorry to say Chicken,”

Eve pulls out a real life machete handing it over to the blonde. “But Auntie Claire and Auntie Eve are kinda nuts. BUT we do everything to protect you Chicken.” She leans in towards her surrogate niece and winks dried blood cakes her face and teeth. The bag she carries clinks with more objects but what they are whose to know besides the rolled up painting. “Man you're way more fun then Dick.” She calls out to Tyler as she walks in step with Claire. It definitely feels like the good old days.

She debates on whether or not she should offer her Libby her gun but the woman has her fire extinguisher and Eve thinks she looks good. “Okay so.. honesty hour.” she checks the gun’s magazine and sees its short a couple rounds. Not reloading she holds it at ready and looks over to Tyler and Libby. “When we're out of here I must speak with you. Doc’s dying is on my brain, my hands. I'll explain.” She gives the two a sad look.

“But for now we have to stop the unleashing of a real not alive zombie apocalypse.” Cracking her neck she gives the look at the remaining unopened Snickers as she tosses the wrapper of the one she ate on the floor.

The dark haired woman tosses the unopened Snickers bar towards Quinn. “Hey Quinnie can you hold my Snickers? It's about to get..”

“Even more fucked up in here.”

Fuck. Well, there goes that plan. Gillian stays quiet for a long time as she tries to think. She had replication once. Two of them, actually. And they both worked differently.

There was her brothers, but then there was another. And one, when she lost it, left a remnant. A name she’d already been called once today. Stef.

“I have an idea, but it may not work. It’s better than nothing.” She looks over at her daughter, at the other women as they sign on for what they think might be a suicide mission. She wants to ask Jolene to find an exit and go, to leave. She already watched her die once today, but—

Her idea might need her. “Did you see what I did earlier with the zombie Knox? The violet lightning thing? Do you think you can do that too?” She doesn’t know if her daughter can just pick up every aspect of people’s abilities, but… even if she can’t if she’d seen it surely she can replicate it. Perhaps the two of them together can duplicate the effect, at least enough to matter.

Cause she can’t think of any other way out of this. “We’ll try it when we get there. Let’s go.”

“You lead by example,” Lene explains to Gillian, “I'll follow. If I can feel it, see it, I can do it.” It's a bit of an overconfident boast, but it's designed to inspire more than define. In Lene’s home time, inspiration often meant the difference between finding the strength of hope or the despair of loss.

As the group heads out of the lab and back into the hall, Jolene is pensive. Her teeth toy at her bottom lip, brows furrow and eyes cast askance to Gillian and then Eve… and then Claire. Mouthing, “one second,” to Gillian, Lene moves to the front of the group beside Claire.

As she clears that distance, Tyler directs the group to a flight of stairs that goes to the upper level of B-Ring. There's a placard on the wall nearby to where he pauses, and below it are two dead Juliens.

Virology -»

«- Bioscience

The way Tyler points follows the “virology” arrow.

“Hey, um, Claire?” Comes a voice from behind the blonde. Jolene, creeping up on the shorter woman sucks her head down and grimaces awkwardly in her grenade-shredded garb. “Um, you're— you're Claire PetrrBennet, right?”

Jolene smiles, awkwardly, extending a hand. “I know this is a bad time, and you might be a bit rattled, but— in the event we don't make it out of here— I’m uh— Jolene Petrelli.” She cracks an awkward smile. “Gillian and Peter’s— I'm from the future, it's— I sound like a crazy-person.”

As Jolene is making her awkward introduction, the large group reaches the top of the stairs and crosses a bullet-riddled hallway. Shell casings lay on the floor and signs of past violence are everywhere. Tyler leads the group down a hall with drizzled droplets of blood on the tile. Gunfire can be heard a floor away, along with screams and horrible mechanical noises.

“Gillian,” comes a whisper from Libby as she slips to the back of the group. “You're— the only person I know here. And I— you know Richard, right? The— the real one?” She has no other way to define it. “If… if Tyler and I don't make it out of here. Tell him— tell him we appreciate all he tried to do for us. Tell him— “ she second guesses herself. “Just, don't let him feel guilty.”

“We’re here,” Tyler calls to the others, with the head of the group stopped at a pair of sliding double doors slick with blood. “Trust me,” Tyler says confidently, “you don't want to know how hard it was to lock them all up in there.”

«EMERGENCY EVACUATION PROTOCOLS IN PLAY.»

“Oh, that's— that's probably nothing.” Tyler says with a grimace.

«HUMANE OVERRIDES ENGAGED»

“Ok, that's— that sounds positive!” Tyler amends.

«SECURITY LOCK OVERRIDE»

“That's— bad. That's bad?” Tyler turns to the doors as they slide open revealing a screaming mass of naked Julien Dumont clones with different degrees of horrifying mutations; missing eyes, twisted limbs, sagging skin, warped appendages. “Fuck— Shitty SHIT Fuck fuck!” Tyler screams as he scrambles back and a rushing horse of clones floods out of the doors.

Claire disappears in a moment, enveloped by the grasping, biting, clawing sea of bodies. “Oh no!” Tyler screams, swinging his axe wildly and clipping chunks off of Juliens. “Oh my cotton socks this is bad! I'm so sorry!”

Following along, Lynette has very little to say. She checks on her ammo — still good — and she has to shake off some flickering sparks coming off her fingers. If anyone knew her well enough, they’d know it was a sign of emotional distress, but as she tends to keep that to herself, it probably seems like residual electricity from her overload earlier. Her attention seems mostly inward. Until it isn’t. She looks up at the new messages, an eyebrow lifting. She looks over to Tyler when he starts to downplay it a little. And then she shakes her head when the system — inevitably — turns against them.

“I dare say it’s bad, yes.”

She’s far back enough to be able to watch as the clones pour out of the doors and Claire disappearing in the mass. Her eyes widen. She hesitates. It’s only a moment, but it’s there. When she snaps to, it’s with a clenched jaw and hardened expression.

“Open a firing lane,” she shouts to the others just before she lifts a hand to start hitting the Juliens with bolts. One at a time, because there is an ally or two in the fray. But she tries her best to keep them from being able to flank the group.

There is no fear from the young blonde, bracing herself for the flood of bodies. Feet planted, blue eyes wait with an almost eagerness. That could be a little concerning… Something that is probably courtesy of her time overseas and her time as a tiny terrorist. There is a shout of defiance as the first bodies reach her, her shotgun firing until it is empty, point blank most of the time. She won’t look very pretty covered in the blood of her enemy.

Once her shells are spent, the shotgun is thrown a side and the machete is flipped around clutched in hand, with a wicked, blood covered smile. The team won’t see her go under without a fight. Teeth clenched against the pain, blade in motion, she’ll disappear from view; but, that doesn’t mean she isn’t still giving as much as she is getting.

Which is a really bad thing to say when buried under so many naked men.

“God dammit! That hurt you son of a—” and various such comments can be heard to let others know she is still alive in there…. Somewhere.

"Oh fucking fuck fuck!" Quinn yells. In that instant, a very distinct instinct takes over, and Robyn Quinn turns on her heel as she prepares to book it the fuck away. She stops short of any such action, though, steadied by thoughts of her friends here, new and old, and her hope that they could get someone out alive.

The sound of a snap crackle echoes in the back of her mind, and as she feels that electric energy from Gillian. Quinn's eyes widen and she spins back around, almost like she does some sort of out of place spin as she suddenly reaches out to take Gillian's hand. "So I'm going t' try somethin' someone showed me once an' I'm not sure it's gonna work, an' I'm gonna need anythin' you can spare for it," she remarks to the other woman.

She swallows audibly. "Jolene if you can spare me a moment without dyin', I need all the light you can give me!" She's sure the other woman had plans of her own for how to deal with these Julian clones, but it'll be an immense help to Quinn. She might not need Jolene, but- this was how she remembered it working. Even as a few of the Julian clones turn their attention towards her, she shakes, and raises a hand, bright light beginning to emanate from her hands.

"An' maybe look away," she offers as the light from her palm continues to get brighter and brighter. She was told once she could shine as bright as a lighthouse. It was time to see what she could do with even more in her. "Oh Gods please let this work an' not kill me," she says quietly.

This is stupid, something says in the back of her mind, lights beginning to dance across her eyes as her breathing quickens. But she did it so easily, so maybe- She closes her eyes for a moment, and when Quinn opens them again  there’s a rim of light around her irises. Screw it. We’re gonna die if we don’t do something. She had told Ygraine she would hold nothing back, give everything and more. Well. Here it was. Here was everything she had, and more.

And with that she groans, trying to collect as much of the light as she can between her fingers, and focus through the increasingly strong throbbing she feels in her temples.

There is a moment of sheer and utter terror for the midnight haired woman, eyes wide as she takes a moment to look over at Gillian and then Claire is being pulled in and Eve cannot leave her buddy hanging. Leveling her firearm at the clones she pops off shots as she strides forward making sure not to fire near her allies.

“GILLY! Ooooh Chicken! What if you guys make a bunch of Lene’s! Fight clone with clone!” The oracle shouts as she digs her hand into her messenger bag. A look is thrown Lynette’s way and she flicks her head back. “Okay back up ladies and angel face dude!” She moves in front of the other women shooting another Julien in a deformed leg. “Claire!! Incoming.. don't lose your head!”

 Her gaze searches for her fellow crazy and shaking her head she pulls a grenade. Grabbing the pin with her teeth she pulls it out and spits it at the Juliens speeding towards her. With a manic laugh Eve throws the grenade in the middle of the Juliens and screams,

“Crazy is as crazy fucking does and these crazies are getting shit DONE!!!!”

Backpedaling once she throws the grenade, the woman has an expression of extreme mischief in her eyes. Diving through the air away from the horde of nakedness. “Take cover you silly ladies!”

Yes. Gillian knows Richard. At Libby’s request, she gives a solemn nod in response. “I’ll make sure he knows.” She intends to survive, after all, she never intended to die. She would not have brought her daughter along if that were the case— But almost no one intends to die. Richard Cardinal will have the message delivered. Though she hopes that they will be able to do it themselves.

She has a crazy plan, after all. One she will try, even if she has no idea if it will work. They’ll just need to find the root for it.

As soon as those doors opened, Gillian started feeding energy into the two women with ranged powers, but when Quinn specifically asks for everything she’s got, she takes the woman she shares a daughter with (sort of) by the hand and the glow changes. It had only been in her eyes until then, but it spreads through her hand, into Quinn’s hand. Violet. Pale. Paler than before. She holds back enough to keep her mobile, standing, but the rest slams into Quinn.

Because she thinks she has a pretty good idea what’s about to happen. She too once trained with Colette, leading up to the Pinehearst raid.

And thanks to the warning, she shields her eyes and stays a decent distance back.

At Eve’s warning, she moves back, hoping that the wall is enough cover while still feeding as much as she can into the photokinetic.

A wall of bloody meat, sinew, and bone pours out of the doorway. In the middle of it all, Claire is surrounded by gore and limbs. The ringing in her ears from the shotgun blasts deafens her to the clones’ gibberish screams. The blade of her machete cleaves through arms, dislodges mandibles, gets wedged in skulls, carves apart a seemingly unending horde.

Eve’s reckless gunfire ricochets off of walls, punches through clones, and then— Eve—

No one really notices the grenade rolling beneath all of the clones.

Lene steps beside Gillian, raises a hand, “This is gonna be Primal!” She howls, before unleashing two waves of power at once. One is a cascade of violet light fed into Gillian and chain-amplifying Quinn. The other is a darkening blot as she peels all visible light from the room like cloth from a table.

Light collects in a glowing, marble-sized bead in front of Quinn. Tyler is pushed back by the horde, axe used as a brace under a clone’s threat to keep gnashing teeth away. Libby is back, back, back on the stairs watching from around the corner when—

Quinn focuses all of her energy into a single beam of light that is the sole, blinding-white focus in the room.

A grenade goes off at Claire’s feet.

The beam of light lances out from Quinn’s hand and burns a smoking hole through a series of Dumont clones.

The grenade shockwave sends Eve, Gillian, Lene, and Quinn flying back past Lynette.

The beam of light whips around like an uncontrolled fire hose in the hall, leaving glowing gashes in metal and concrete and the smell of sizzling flesh.

Light levels return to normal, there's dust, shambling, and—

They made a firing lane.

Both of Lynette’s hands explode with lightning in snapping, buzzing arcs. Julien clones burst into flames, rupture from within, explode into strips, or are simply charred beyond recognition by the full force of the blast.

Dust clears, and a legless Claire Bennet has half an arm cauterized off by a laser and is patiently re-collecting her limbs amid a charred mass of Julien Dumont remains.

Sparks shower down from the ceiling.

One side of the doors simply falls out of its sliding runner onto the floor with a clatter.

Tyler Case, under a smoking corpse, mumbles. “Is— there a gas leak in here?” Then, as he looks around the room blearily asks, “and is it only affecting me and Eve?”

From nearby on the ground to Tyler, Jolene plucks a piece of shrapnel from her side. “Primal,” she whispers in shell shocked bemusement.

“What is wrong with all of you!?” Libby screams from the stairwell, but no one can really hear any of that. Because of the explosion.

For a good, long while it's just Lynette picking Dumont and Bennet out of her hair while Quinn, Gillian, Lene, and Eve recover hearing and the sense of what way is up. Quinn’s eyes tingle, vision blurry in a way that blinking can't fix.

Once Claire has Humpty-Dumptied herself back together again with the cavalier nonchalance that is her way, she can see another door fifty feet ahead in the hall off corpses.

Not having bothered to get up, Tyler waves a hand in the air. “Root’s behind there,” and then quieter, “Can I lay here? For— a while?”

As the dust settles, Lynette does spend an inordinate amount of time on her hair. There’s little hope for it, though, as blood and viscera are difficult to pluck free. But she does her level best. And it keeps her from having to watch another person put themselves back together. Her expression is calm, which is not at all appropriate for the moment, but sometimes it’s better to shut down than process what’s actually happening. Either that or she’s getting used to making people explode, and let’s hope it’s not that.

She looks over at Tyler when he speaks up, then up past the piles of dead bodies. “If you think it’s safe, you can stay put and we’ll get you on the way back out.” It might be better, really, if their axe-wielding friend is at the back of the group for this part.

“Eve, darling,” she notes next, turning in the precog’s direction, “next time, can you tell us earlier that you have grenades? It would be most helpful.” And that’s when she comes along to Quinn, Lene and Gillian, crouching near by to check them over. “Everyone okay over here? No missing limbs?” That’s a joke. Dark, but still.

“If anyone has any ideas about how to get the root out of here,” she says as a general note, “I’m open to suggestions.”

The door at the far end of the carnage is studied. “There?” Claire asks, but not really asking it of anyone. Machete is dropped on the ground next to Tyler, so that the tiny blonde can at least help him get out from under the corpse.

Crouching down, next to him, the former cheerleader, offers him a reassuring smile. It might look a little creepy with her face and clothing covered in blood; not to mention bits of clones in her hair. “I think you have earned a time out.” A reassuring pat to his arm and Claire is on her feet again, machete in hand again, strolling through the viscera – stepping over the bigger bits.

Something occurs to the small woman. “Wait.”

Claire turns on the ball of her foot to look back at the group behind her; specifically, her eyes land on Jolene…. then Gillian…. And then back again. “Peter and….?” she points at Gillian with the giant knife. “ But you…” Now she just looks confused, then frustrated. Clearly, she missed out on something while she was stuck in here.

“Know what… tell me later, when there is less chance of you dying,” she growls out with irritation, waving it away with a hand. “Let’s get this guy and get everyone out.” Just like that… Claire is back on task.

Even knocked to the ground as she has been, Quinn is starry eyed as her vision swirls. For a moment, she just stares out at the carnage, light still dancing across her eyes.

I did it.

Her eyes wide, head and heart beating like a hammer, she tries not to focus on the tingling she feels behind her eyes. Instead, she stares ahead and past Lynette - she doesn’t even notice Claire, for better or worse. When she had seen Colette do the same thing, the most it had done was leave a char line across the wall, burn an old Midtown flyer in half. It had been a snap, crackle, pop, over in an instant. And that had been with every ounce of the lighthouse bright light that Quinn had been able to provide. A brief pulse and a flash of something Quinn had never before imagined. But this?

This was magnificent.

Little motes of light still dance from her fingers, wisps rising up from her  itching eyes as she scrambles up to feet, not even noticing as the motes of light flicker and fade away as though they were never there. Pushing the strange intensity she feels back as much as she can, she lets out the most excited laugh she can manage. She doesn't take Lynette's hand. Instead, the widest smile she's ever worn forms across her face, pure glee, pure satisfaction about what's just happened. She blinks, vision darkening slightly as she reaches up and rubs her eyes, unable to resist a scratch at that flaring she feels. There's a bit of slickness under her eye, but she attributes it to the explosions.

"Oh my God," she says quietly, peak joy on her face as she turns back to Gillian and Jolene, the flare starting to turn warm. "Did you guys see that?! Oh my God, I've never done anythin' like that before!" She's too pleased with herself to worry about Tyler, or the root. Or to notice what the others may as she looks around excited - most people, when pushed so far end up with nosebleeds.
Instead, she is bleeding from her tear ducts, one side smeared from where she had run her hand.

"Oh my God, that was so prim-"

She doesn't finish.

Not before she freezes, her elation fading from her face, expression twisted into one of absolute horror.

Robyn Quinn lets out a shrill, blood curdling scream as the warm itch suddenly becomes a burning behind her eyes. Hands reaching up to clasp at them as she stumbles back, continuing to scream.
It doesn't look it, but her eyes are on fire.

There's a loud ringing assaulting Eve’s ear and she nudges Tyler's butt with her foot which he was laying on. “Squishy! Hop up Lazybones.” As Claire trots over Eve grins widely and looks from Claire to Tyler. “I've never seen a more crazy match that could work.” She whispers to the blonde before hopping to her feet. There's just so much blood on her. Clothes, hair, face, teeth. Her wardrobe has seen better days.

As she looks down in her bag reaching a hand in some more things still shuffle around inside, her eyebrows quirk as Lynette requests for Eve to not blow them up basically and she absently nods her head, “Yes Spar-Lady Zeus.” She whispers satisfied that the painting is in tact. A few scoffs marr the back of the painting but she sees nothing has burned through it. Folding it over one more time to make it more compact she shoves it firmly at the bottom of the bag. She hates to do that to her artwork but better that than falling out and burning.

“Libby dear this is just a little fun! You should have seen when we all fought on the bridge. That thing went up in smoke and flames.”

“Chicken you are so impressive I mean has anyone told you how primal you are.” Eve calls out to Lene as she watches her not-niece pull pieces out of her. Pulling up close to Gillian, Lene and Quinn, a look is given back to Lynette. “If you shock him just enough to being unconscious maybe a bunch of clone Lene’s can carry him out!” Her brow furrows as she opens her mouth to speak again but then Quinn is reveling in her boosted capabilities and Eve grins knowing the feeling of being boosted by Gillian (even though most times when that happens Eve ends up knocked out but hey she sees that as a good time).

Quinn’s screams of excitement turn to ear drum bursting screams of pain and Eve covers her ears with a Desert Eagle and her free hand. Ouch! “Quinnie Quinnie!” Eve holsters her firearm and slides to the ground to grab at Quinnie’s shoulders to hold her steady. “Water!?” She's not sure how to help actually.. a brief look to Claire. An injection of Claire? “Hold on Quinnie, ah fuck.”

“Ow.” is a statement from Gillian before she pushes herself back to her feet. She’d hoped to avoid getting blown back, but— “We’re going to need a million showers when this is over,” she mutters quietly. And even after those million showers she still thinks she’ll be smelling, tasting and hearing this for weeks. She starts to flex her hands, checking to see how much energy she has left— but everything she had went into getting Quinn to fire her first ever laser—

Oh. Claire earns a glance when she realizes exactly what’s being said over the ringing in her ears. “Apparently in some future.” Futures? She has a moment when she looks mildly sheepish, but— “Yeah, we’ll wait til we’re out of here.” But her daughter had wanted to know more family, so— She can’t help but smile a little that it’s happening. Even in this situation. This horrible, horrible situation. Where people start bleeding from the eyes.

Speaking of which… When she grabbed Quinn’s hand, Gillian had come to expect what might have happened a moment later. Two powers sometimes work differently, so she’d hoped, but when the other woman starts bleeding from her eyes and screaming. Maybe certain things stayed the same between the same abilities.

She joins the others around Quinn, “You did wonderfully, Quinn. This is almost over,” she says, speaking in, unfortunately, her mom voice. The same one she uses when trying to calm the Lighthouse Kids. There’s a reason she never attempted lasers when she had this power. Colette had warned her

“If someone wants to get her out, go now. We have to finish this.” One way or another. She just hopes it ends out better for Tyler than he planned going in, the ax wielding man earns another glance.

Ears still ringing, Tyler stumbles over to the wall and holds one hand against the side of his head. Libby comes over, resting a hand on his shoulder as she watches the others. Quinn’s screaming reaction draws a look of frozen panic from Libby; she has no way to understand what's happening.

Jolene does, however.

“Quinn,” Jolene steps over to her, hand firmly gripping her shoulder. “Quinn you— fuck, that's right you're not— fuck.” In the heat of the moment, Jolene had forgotten when she is, and that this isn't the same Quinn she knows. Not yet, at least.

“She's burned out her color receptors,” Jolene says sharply back to the others. “I don't think she's— “ the screaming isn't stopping. “Okay, okay— “ Jolene waves Libby over. Reluctantly, Tyler’s sister disengages from her brother and cautiously approaches.

“I need you to stay with her,” Lene requests, motioning to Quinn. “Reactor is melting down, we don't have time. Whatever behind that door,” Lene motions to the door by Lynette, “we need to handle it. Okay?”

In spite of herself, or perhaps because she can't truly think straight, Libby agrees and puts a hand on Quinn’s back. “I'm here… it's—okay?”’Jolene grimaces. That'll have to do.

“We've gotta hustle, no time.” Jolene asserts, stepping around Eve with a delicate touch to the older woman’s back. “Eve, for the love of god, hang back.” She looks Eve square in the eyes. “Be chalk, okay? — Cool, be cool.” This decade isn't ready for some slang yet.

Leaving Eve to ponder how and if those two things are related, Jolene joins Lynette by the last pair of doors. She looks back at Tyler, seeing him ambling over to join them, axe over his shoulder. Tyler gives Gillian a nod, and motions to the door.

“It's unlocked,” Tyler offers with a nod. “We uh, kinda were running screaming through that first set.” A moment later, Jolene presses the open button on the door, and a chunk of Julien falls from between the shut doors, revealing a large laboratory with multiple damaged workstations and centrifuges.

Horrifically, this room is alive.

There was once a containment chamber at the back of the room. A glass-walled enclosure like a Sea World shark tank. Now that nine inch thick glass is shattered, and a pulsating mass of tumorous flesh has bulged forth. Jolene gags the moment she sees what the room has become.

That mass of flesh spills out like molten wax onto the floor, spreads up as far as the ceiling with twitching arms, bristling with vestigial eyes and fingers. Multiple moaning faces of Julien Dumont are molded together into a slack-jawed visage of hell.

Blind arms grope around the lab, and some wield surgical tools and have cut the main mass open. Others have stuffed clear plastic tubing into the openings, which appear to be filling the bloated mass of flesh with the luminous blue liquid of Refrain. The glow is so bright it shines through the cancerous mass’ veins.

At the center of this all, a Kafkaesque cocoon of meat and sinew partially envelopes a bloated and deformed body belonging to Julien Dumont, but this Julien has a now warped black tattoo of a tree over his skin.

Jolene vomits here.

“Ssssabiiiiine,” all the faces of Julien moan in unison. “Sssssabine, I llllooooove yyyyoouuu,” the groaning, muffled cry is the hypnotic murmur of someone under the effects of Refrain. Julien Dumont may be here physically, but that is all. His mind is somewhere else, a past, a memory in refrain.

With Quinn’s care passed to others, Lynette turns toward the hallway and those coming along to save the original Julien. She stays near Jolene on the path over the river of blood and through the woods of… limbs and organs and various other horrors. And she puts herself in front of the doors as the girl pushes the button.

A piece of Julien falls out.

Lynette tenses up. And sighs.

And then steps over that chunk and into the lab proper. As much as it would probably be a good idea to get a good look at the place, the broken glass draws her attention. And what is oozing out of it. The flesh, the limbs, faces, eyes, the cuts… it’s all taken in in the span of a breath. A gasp. It’s horror written on her face, and even she can’t hide that. She has scars marking a similar experience, when the institute found uses for her flesh and her mind. Fingers absent-mindedly trace the line of a scar across her arm, tucked away under her sleeve.

She barely notices Jolene’s reaction, as she steps forward almost as if she’s in a trance.

And maybe she is, drawn by the bright blue glow of Refrain, by its promise of a better world, of easier times. She hasn’t always had the best luck with the memories it decides to give, but she can’t think of anything in her past that wouldn’t be better than this moment. Plans, rescues, escapes… that all falls away as the electrokinetic heads for the mass of flesh. Or, more accurately, toward the tubing that pumps in the drug. It was difficult enough to ignore earlier.

Now it’s hard to say if she even tries to.

At the door, Claire stops.

There is a blink.

It is tough, but understanding dawns on the young blonde, she sends a sidelong glance to Tyler, all humor – amusement – is zapped from her face at the harshness of reality. Memories of being an experiment herself in Madagascar seem tame to what is before her. She can’t help but feel pity for the monster. “If we… put him out of his misery, how….” Claire turns towards the man with a serious expression, machete still — dripping with blood and gore — resting on her should. “How long would you have… before…” whatever happens to him happens.

Lynette’s actions don’t really register with Claire, having never known the woman before tonight.

Instead she turns to Eve. “You have another grenade in there?” Blue eyes touch on the bag the seer is holding. “If you do… let me see it,” her voice calm despite the horrors beyond. There is a plan in her mind, but she looks back at Libby and Tyler, looking a touch sad, “And there is nothing else…?” Anything else, they could do for him?

Quinn is probably thrilled she can't see what's waiting for them in the room where Julian Dumont is being held. Or maybe she would be, except she's still screaming. She doesn't even really notice the hand on her shoulder, as much as Libby may try to be comforting. What Quinn feels now is akin to what Jolene had described it as - something in her eyes feels like it's burning from within her skull.

She wails like a banshee as she takes a staggered step forward, ankle giving away as she suddenly falls to her knees with a loud thunk. Fingers spread over her eyes slightly, Libby can maybe see the way her eyes shake behind them, a little bit of blood dripping out past her wrist. What no one can see is the horror Quinn has before her as she watches colours peel and melt away from the world around her, as if someone set old movie reels on fire with a greyscale copy waiting beneath.

She holds out her hands, eyes still shaking as blood streaks down her cheeks. They glow, but flicker. A small ball of light forms, before it too flickers and fades, and try as Quinn might, she can’t seem to summon another one to form, a choked out gasp issuing forth as she recoils back, eyes widening as the glow fades entirely from her hands.

The light in the room seems to grow, bright, bright, bright without her help, though. It glares and it pierces, another wail following as Quinn pulls her hands back over her eyes and closes her fingers. The light, her greatest treasure and steadfast ally in the last few years, hurts. It burns almost as much as whatever is happening to her eyes. The world is darker - not gone, but obscured. Blurry. Grey. Swimming. She chokes out a whimper as she shakes.

"NO!" she screams, hunching over. "Oh god, it hurts!" Real tears begin to mix in, sliding her cheek as she gasps and screams again, falling to her side on the floor. For a moment seems like another wave of shrieks is coming, when-

It stops.

All sound stops from Quinn for just a moment, before the sobbing resumes. At least the screaming seems to have ended.

“I'll have you know Chicken that chalk is disgusting. I am way cool Little Miss. The most cool.” Because Auntie is the cool Aunt and don't you flipping forget it. Eve walks with Libby and Quinn keeping a close eye on Gillian and the rest as she walks in the back with the other two. She's only doing it cuz Quinn needs support of course. As Lene pukes.

“See Chicken, that's like chalk.”

When the ragtag team comes upon the laboratory and the monstrosity that's inside Eve frowns and a sad look enters the oracle’s eyes as she sees Julien. “Poor Julien.. doomed because someone couldn't let things be.” She’s one to talk obviously but that's besides the point.

Before she can give Claire an answer she notices Lynette walking in that strange way.. and her eyes widen as she takes in the sight of the Refrain and then Lynette’s expression. “No no no, Sparktacus no!”

Making sure Quinn is okay or as okay as she can be with Libby she charges towards Lynette arms outstretched to grab the blonde from behind and pull her back, probably onto the floor.

………….

So much for plan C, which is what Gillian had been calling Lynette’s plan in her head. As soon as she sees what has become of the root, she, like her daughter, gags, nearly emptying her stomach right beside her. This fucking place. This fucking place. “Well, consolation prize, I don’t think Plan A would have worked either,” she mutters in that horrified rasp, looking back toward Eve and past her in the general direction that they’d left Tyler. They could have gotten him into that body, but could it fucking move? Probably not.

She shudders at the sight again, before gathering herself. “No, Claire, there’s one more thing. It’s a long shot, but let’s try it before we do anymore killing.” Especially not of Tyler. With a few deep breaths, she looks at the Refrain and shakes her head, she too, had used it a few times. Like so many others. But no, no time for that. “Sorry if this doesn’t work.” But it’s better than Plan B, cause Plan B sucks.

“Jolene, I need you to follow my lead. I might be enough for this, but if not…”

Two is better than one. Always. “No grenades. Just try to find a soft spot if you can, shoot every head if you have to, but wait until the lightning turns as white as possible.”

Whatever that means. Oh, she really doesn’t want to do this. This is so fucking gross. But she steps closer and tries to find a… place to grab onto this monstrosity that once was a man. Because for what she wants to do, she needs contact. Just like she’d done with zombieKnox. Instead of the usual glow that they’re used to, they see something like lightning spark in her eyes, and her hands where she touches him.

It’s the only plan she has. Instead of pushing energy into him, she’s pulling it from him. And since she used almost all her energy to help with the lasers, she has a lot of room.

“Uh, Gillybean, what’re you— uh— Nope! No! No ah, Julien is not a hugger!” Tyler hop-steps over smoldering corpse parts into the lab. His eyes go wide when he sees the effect the Refrain has has on him, one hand over his mouth. “O-okay— he's uh— I guess he's— “ Tyler’s dark eyes flick over to Gillian as he hisses. “He's gross don't touch that!”

Jolene, however, just presses a hand to Tyler’s shoulder in a ssh gesture. With that she's walking past him, brushing gently past Claire, then Lynette. She stops there, green eyes settling on the electrokinetic. “If mo— mmmmum— Gillian passes out, light this entire fucking room up.” She smiles, anxiously, and squeezes Lynette’s shoulder reassuringly before moving next to Gillian.

Under the effects of Gillian’s ability, Julien lets out a whining groan. His faces and limbs contort into an anguished mass, and Jolene joins alongside her mother, following suit. Her ability crackles into the tumorous mass of Dumonts, and Tyler squints at the bright light it brings forth.

There's howls, screams, limbs contorting in tangled masses followed by baleful cries of agony. “SSSSSSABIIIIIINE,” Dumont’s heads all scream in unison. The violet energy turns white under the double-amplified strain and Tyler finally realizes what they're doing when he feels a prickling sensation in the back of his head.

Eyes up, hand fishing in his pocket, Tyler lunges past Lynette and Claire and stabs Gillian in the side of her neck with a syringe. “Fuck him up!” Tyler shouts as he depresses the plunger, overloading Gillian with a full syringe of amphodynamine.

Gillian’s pupils expand, swallow her iris, turn her eyes into black pools. Jolene jerks to the side, sees the syringe, the black fluid and looks horrified at first until she sees Gillian’s shocked expression turn into a smile. She gasps, jaw trembling, and then throws amplification out to Gillian rather than draining Julien. Tyler must have a plan, right?

“I have no idea what this will do!” Tyler screams, hands holding Gillian’s shoulders tightly, “but we’re gonna do what my friends always do! Get pumped up be an unearned sense of confidence and then fuck everyone up!”

Gillian’s fingertips burn, her mind reels, she's never felt this much power before. Amp, combined with her daughter flipping her focus to amplifying Gillian’s draining power. It's almost enough to –

The blinding white lights extending off of Gillian’s hand dips back down into the purple shade of the color spectrum. Then goes violet, she starts amplifying Julien. He lets out a scream, and arms start to push their way through the flappy meat curtains that is his body.

“Oh— oh shit I— I can hear him in my— in my head woah woah Gillybean stop!” Tyler’s warning is lost on Gillian, she feels something, something deep down in herself that she first felt on the Pinehearst rooftop. She feels something unbelievable, another sensation, like a limb she didn't know she had.

Jolene’s breath hitches in the back of her throat, the violet of Gillian’s energy reflected in her eyes. They tear up, her lips part in a smile, you can do it she encourages, and the light reflected in Jolene’s eyes shifts form purple…

To red.

“Oh SHIT!” Tyler screams, turning around to warn everyone, “She's gonna— “ But then everything happens at once. The red lightning arcing off of Gillian’s body flares brightly. Her arms ache, burn, tremble and shake as she feels Julien’s ability. Feels it with her fingers, like a tangible thing.

Breathless and overwhelmed with unfathomable power, Gillian tears Julien Dumont’s ability out of his body. She can see it like a light in her mind, cradled between two curled fingers, before she slams it into Tyler Case.

There is an eruption of energy, red lightning arcs off of Tyler and he lets out the most riotous howl ever heard. His eyes flood with crimson radiance and he feels his power coming from Gillian. But then, he feels something else— something impossible.

“I'm in charge.” The red lightning snaps away, Gillian’s power cuts out and Jolene stops in coordinated response. The ability manipulator’s knees buckle, and she partly collapses into her daughter’s arms. But she's still conscious— still here— and she's never felt more alive.

Jolene loops one of Gillian’s arms around her shoulder and guides her away from the former root’s body. “We have to go!”

“Sparky! Eve! Eclair!” Tyler shouts, covering his head with both hands as he scrambles away from the mass. “Light it up!”

“No!” Lynette yells when Eve grabs her, and she struggles to get free of the other woman’s grip. Physically, though, Lynette doesn’t bring much to the table, no more than the average person, and the pair ends up hitting the ground roughly. She slams a hand on the floor, trying to pull herself out from under the precog and off toward the drug.

Luckily, she doesn’t make it far before the commotion in the room draws her attention. She looks over to see Gillian and her lightning, watches it change color. She recognizes that lightning. The red stuff. And it occurs to her that they might actually have the upper hand. Her eyes move to Tyler and she actually smiles when the power sticks the landing.

“I’m okay,” she says to Eve, her voice calmer again, “it’s okay.” But she doesn’t shuffle the woman off her, perhaps to prove that the urge has passed. And since her power usually focuses through her hands, Eve is safe enough when Lynette aims in Julien’s tortured direction and fires a stream of lightning into him. She can take direction, see?

Shotgun retrieved while Gillian lights up the monstrosity – well… maybe after a moment of wide-eyed staring, because… Holy crap that is awesome! —  shells pressed into place one at a time, Claire’s lips are pressed into a thin line of concentration. There doesn’t seem to be any care for her bloodied appearance or the ropes of matted hair. The tiny blonde sets the butt of her gun to her shoulder and opens fire, once the order is given.

“Eve! Grenade and go!” Claire snaps out as she reloads the shotgun again, for one last round. She gives the last shell in pocket a kiss for good luck and pushes it into the chamber and then with a pump of the slide, she starts firing again. She’ll be the last one to leave, bringing up the rear of the group when it is all said and done.

For the most part, Quinn is still sprawled out on the floor and still sobbing, unaware of the absolute miracle that has transpired in the other room. Hands grasp at the floor, trying desperately to grasp at something so she can at least pull herself up to her knees. She feels weak all over, like it wasn't just light she had drained to perform her own miracle earlier - she had drained her own physical well being as well.

Maybe she did, from what croaks out of her lips next.

"I can't- I can't see," she says hoarsely, grasping around for Libby. It's not entirely accurate, there's a lot of quasi-distinct swirling gray shapes in her vision, but with the way the light burns now she feels effectively blind. She can hear the commotion happening from the room where Julian was being held, and does her best to lean up halfway, arms shaking.

"Did they… do it?" Quinn asks, voice as shaky as the arm that props her up, staring off in the direction she hears the others coming from. She looks around, to where she had last seen Libby Case, and swallows. "Can we get out of here yet?"

“No no Lady Zeus we can get stoned after this promise!” Eve yells as she wrestles Lynette to the ground and holds her there. There are advantages to being her height. That does not mean this is easy and Lynette is bucking like a bull in heat so Eve holds on for dear life making herself deadweight. “Ow! Lady! Why I-Ow!” An elbow hits Eve in the side twice but before she can make another sound of protest to the woman beneath Gillian starts funneling her ability into Julien and..

“THAT’S RIGHT GILLY!! LIGHT THAT MOTHER UP!!!”

Best friend is proud. As Gillian’s lightning changes color she cheers not as heavy on Lynette anymore because everyone is stunned by the display of her ability. “Primal..” She whispers with a roguish grin as they are given the okay to light this mother up in their own way. Except Eve didn't roll off Lynette before she started using her ability and while she channels it through her hands a few wayward sparks hit Eve in the face and shoulders.

“Owwww! Fuck!” The oracle rolls off of Lynette and shakes herself, the sparks not doing much but a mild shock but still well shocking. A look is given to the mangled root and she whips out her Desert Eagle and her smaller firearm. Firing off shots concurrently as she howls with laughter. “This is really fucked up.. but really fun!” Fun? A moment of sadness washes over the seer though as she climbs to her feet backing away. This guy Julien didn't do a goddamn thing to deserve this. (That we know of.) “The Valkyries await you in Valhalla deformed soldier!”

As Claire bellows her request to Eve the woman’s ears perk and she gives a dark grin to the blonde. Holstering the smaller handgun again she lifts the flap of her bag and digs in pulling out another grenade out, pulling the pin with her blood stained teeth yet again. She laughs maniacally as she throws the grenade hard up and into the mass that is Julien. Retreating into the hall she fires a few more rounds and then breaks out into a dead run with the others. Time to split.

There’s a dimpled smile on Gillian’s face as she sags against her daughter and tries to catch her breath. She’s no longer glowing or crackling, no longer emitting various shades on purple, red or white. Even without the appearance of it, she still feels it rippling through her, tingling under her skin. Power she’d barely felt before. A primal power. And she almost didn’t want it to stop.

Almost.

As the taller girl guides her out, she’s still looking off into the distance, feeling that energy. It's always been there, just out of reach. An energy within all of them, thrumming under the surface. Something she’d always been able to sense, but…

“That went better than I could have hoped,” she whispers quietly to her daughter, to herself.

And she sounds proud of herself, content even. Like that was something she’d always been meant to do. Of course, she’s also high, so that probably has something to do with it. Amp, after all, was even more of as much of a high as Refrain. She doesn’t watch to see what happens to the creature that had once been a man. Before the Institute got their hands on him.

Julien Dumont is a cipher, even in death. He is known only by his name, a seemingly faceless victim of far greater powers at work. Whatever experiments were done down here, whatever way things devolved when the Ark was attacked, may never truly be known. When Lynette’s lightning hits Julien, he lets out one last mournful cry of “Sssssabiiiiine,” as his skin catches fire, as the chemicals in Refrain ignite in his veins.

The gunfire, the screams, the electricity bring this mysterious man used by the Institute to a fiery and agonizing end. It is not merciful, it is not painless, and whoever that poor man was he does not go quietly. In the end, as they flee the lab as it catches fire, as vials marked Advent explode under pressure and heat, nothing is quiet.

When Tyler emerges from the room, Libby looks in disbelief. Tears streak down her face, and she is quick to loop Quinn’s arm around her shoulder to try and help her up and out. Tyler pushes them both, his scream muffled by the sounds of explosions behind them. Eve pushes Claire, Claire runs behind Gillian and Lene, and Lynette brings up the rear.

Faced with Refrain, Lynette can remember its sting, its taste in her veins. The tingle behind her eyes. One, trembling hand of a recovering addict is clutched tight around a vial. She doesn't remember grabbing it, except when she thinks about when Eve hit her, seeing one of the vials under a table. It's hidden away then, in a pocket. A choice to make later.

Under the flash of warning lights, of blaring klaxons, they run. “We have to get to the extraction point!” Jolene screams, running alongside Tyler. They all hustle, down stairs, through a corpse-filled hallway, past Zimmerman’s remains, through the room of inert Dumont clones.

Tyler stops. He looks at them, brows tensing. Jolene notices him stop, circles back and grabs Tyler’s arm. “I can— I can hear them all,” he whispers, and Jolene yanks him back.

“Not now!” Jolene screams, watching as Libby and Quinn run past, followed by Eve, Claire, and Lynette. Tyler, with some protest, turns away and catches up to Gillian at the head of the group. They exit the medical wing, running head-long into a pack of screaming children running out of a smoky hallway.

“This way children! Come on! This way!” Doyle’s voice in the distance, Jolene startles, grabs her mother’s hand and runs. They all hurry down the corridor, hurrying to the sound of others escaping the Ark. suddenly, Jolene skids to a stop and remembers—

Kaylee.

She looks back, side-by-side with Gillian as Lynette helps Quinn past them. Up ahead in the smoke, Else comes into view with a few small children at her side. She grabs Quinn and follows Lynette out.

Gillian and Lene begin moving again, Claire right behind them and there's just enough of a gap between those three that what happens next is a worst-case scenario. One of the walls explodes outward, sending shares of metal and glass everywhere as a machine on four legs comes careening through.

Lene and Gillian exhale shrill screams, and the robot — like some kind of mechanical grizzly bear — rears up on its hind legs. “Run! RUN!” Lene grabs Gillian by the hand and drags her ahead, even as Claire fires back at the machine until her shotgun is out of shells.

“Go up! Go up! We’ll find you!” Lene screams to Eve, Tyler, and Libby as they're cut off. The bear gallops ahead, metal claws scraping on the floor. Gillian scrambles, Lene's shoes slide through someone else's blood. Gunfire pops back from the hallway and the machine crashes into the wall in an uncontrolled charge.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck!” Jolene screams again, catching up just close enough to Lynette to fire an arc of electricity back at the creature. Her heart pounds in her chest, eyes grow wide. The children are all around her, she can feel their abilities rising and falling as they get within proximity. But she keeps running, she and her mother, just feet ahead of the beast.

They slide sideways into a hallway, see Liette up ahead with her twin carrying a dialysis machine. “Where’s Graeme!? Doyle! Where’s Graeme!?” Liette screams, looking around in the smoking hall in panic. Doyle emerges from the smoke and pushes the girls ahead, directing the flow of children into a tunnel.

«WARNING: REACTOR AT CRITICAL. EVACUATE ALL PERSONNEL.»

Alarm klaxons blare in the dark, interspersed by moments of bright orange glow as emergency lights stutter and flicker. The brief illumination of massive, track-laid cylindrical tunnels belies the danger of this place. This is not a subway tunnel, hasn't been for decades. The steel rings reinforcing the tunnel reveal that, the carbon-fiber weave in the concrete. This place was designed to resist an atomic blast. One would suppose that would have to be tested eventually.

«WARNING: REACTOR AT CRITICAL. EVACUATE ALL PERSONNEL.»

Hurried footsteps clatter down the hall, through puddles of standing water, past inert construction equipment peppered with bullet holes. Spent shell casings clink and clatter across the concrete underfoot. Dozens of people rush down the hall, briefly illuminated in silhouettes of frightened, huddled masses. Most of these figures are children, teary-eyed and red-faced, running as fast as they can in the intermittent darkness at the behest of a single man leading the fray. In the orange light, Eric Doyle looks particularly haunting. Dark circles shadow his eyes, stubble on his chin, sweat beads everywhere in the intense, humid heat of the tunnel. He looks back, making sure not a single one of his ducklings is unaccounted for.

«WARNING: REACTOR AT CRITICAL. EVACUATE ALL PERSONNEL.»

Behind the flock of children, there's a blood-curdling scream. Eric skids to a stop, eyes wide and dozens of tiny bodies rushing past him. Over the tops of their heads, he sees it in the dark, a pair of glowing green eyes and the scraping sound of metal-on-metal. The orange flash of the emergency lighting illuminates it for only a moment, a hulking form of exposed carbon-fiber in the shape of a grizzly bear, broad-faced and whirring with hydraulics and synthetic muscle. It shoulders construction equipment out of the way with its broad head, jaws opening to reveal not teeth, but rows of angled grinding blades used to dig through solid rock and steel. The noise it makes isn't a roar, it's a mechanical scream of industrial tools. Blood drips down its jaws.

«WARNING: REACTOR AT CRITICAL. EVACUATE ALL PERSONNEL.»

"Go!" The mechanical bear is slammed to the side, crashes into the reinforced concrete tunnel wall and spiderwebs the rock. Beside it, Jolene Chevalier stands with both hands out, her jacket torn and quilted scarf fluttering behind her. In the orange light her red hair looks like fire, and to Doyle, he just saw her shoulder-check fifteen hundred pounds of steel and death into a wall. She looks back to Eric, blood dripping from a gash across her face that splits brow and cheek. "I said run!" Behind her, he can see more green eyes glowing in the dark.

«WARNING: REACTOR AT CRITICAL. EVACUATE ALL PERSONNEL.»

The beasts roar in the dark.

«WARNING: REACTOR AT CRITICAL. EVACUATE ALL PERSONNEL.»

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