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| Scene Title | Something In The Air |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Team Bravo prepares to set out on the water, but the arrival of an unexpected newcomer and unforeseen wrinkles in their plans complicates matters immensely. |
| Date | November 27, 2009 |
Somewhere in Northwestern Madagascar
It's hard to tell exactly when morning came, but by the time light reaches the waterfall grotto where team Bravo has set up camp deep in the Malagasy jungle, it feels like night may have lasted more than a day. The sky overhead is filled with a thick cotton patchwork of monochrome gradient, dark and stormy shadows hanging low in the sky, fog clinging to the river that cuts visibility down to barely twenty feet. It's under these still raining and humid conditions that the members of Bravo team begin to awake, joining Gabriel in the world of the conscious.
Sanderson is slow to get up come morning, the ache and soreness of her injured arm seeming to make her movements more guarded and stiff than the night before. A breakfast much like her dinner — an MRE eaten out of the airtight packaging serves as an unfortunately chalky way to start her day. Ammunition for her sidearm is checked, and the SatCom device is left clipped to her belt, the cloud-cover too thick to get a signal.
There's no rousing call come morning, no orders to get moving, Lieutenant Sanderson is taking it easy and seems to be allowing the same of the remainder of the team. This may be the one chance they get in their mission to have a relaxing morning, and being prepared for the long journey ahead is of the utmost importance, mentally and physically.
"Fuck." Even if the injuries sustained in the crash landing make it harder for her, more so than anyone else, to enjoy.
Candy slowly awakens on the boat, the hydrokinetic is completely wet from her power tending to go out when she is unconcious. That little minor detail is quickly fixed, as a splash can be heard. The water in her clothes going to rejoin the river, "Ahh… a shower each morning," Candy says with a smile, as she shakes her head and runs a hand through her hair to get the worst of the tangles out. "Don't suppose anyone brought a comb, eh," she asks over the com, since she was likely the only one to sleep on the boat.
Jumping over the side, and landing easily on the surface of the water, Candy begins to walk towards the rest of the folks, whistling a tune as she jams her hands into her pockets. "If anybody wants a Candy-shower, let me know. Its not especially long and luxorious, but it'll get you clean, and dry for a couple moments," Candance announces to those gathered and awake, before grabbing her own MRE and preparing to chow down.
Already awake, on the tail end of his graveyard shift watch, Gabriel has stripped himself of the bulkier clothes and equipment, down to an undershirt and his camo pants, hiking boots off to allow to dry out— hahaha— and seemingly content. In that he's not snarling at anyone and more or less keeping to his silent self as he perches on a where he'd stamped and packed down an earthy patch of ground to sit upon, arms curled around his knees and eyes slightly hooded as he watches the growing light dazzle off the nearby river.
He's finished an MRE for want of anything better to do, "indulging" as soon as light had begun to filter in. Eileen's comms device has found its way into his palm, the other electrical things as well as his weapon lying on his jacket to dry out out— hahaha— as he waits for the women around him to come to.
Considering he doesn't have his radio on, Candy's words specifically are missed, though he does glance towards the signs of movement before stretching out his legs, wincing at the stiffness set into muscle. No reply about whether he wants a Candy-shower save for a cynical brow raise.
When the rest of the group wakes and begins to stir, there is something missing- it may take a second to realize, but Huruma's notable presence appears to be …well, somewhere else. The pack she had stuffed with supplies is still at the camp, as are some various objects that someone might miss. Like boots. And pants. Claire might recall something said about getting up early, if she was actually listening while the two were awake during that first shift.
No answer comes from her when Candy speaks over the local headsets.
Laying there for a time listening to the sound of others, Claire is slow to get up. She hasn't done a whole lot of sleeping being in such a strange place with so many strange noises. Rolling on her side, she shakes her head slowly as she props herself on an elbow. "I think I'll pass." Her words lacking any real emotion. Glancing down beside her, Claire takes notice of a spider trucking right by her. There was a time she might have screamed and jumped up like a girl, but right now…. she has about enough enthusiasm to flick it away from her.
Pushing herself up to sit, Claire pulls her pack to her and starts digging for a dry pair of socks. "So whats the plan today Sanderson?"
Pulling at the bandage on her arm, Sanderson seems to be checking it out nervously as Claire addresses her. Blue eyes alight to the blonde, and Sanderson is quick to pretend she was doing nothing at all. "We're taking the boat…" She says with a tip of her nose towards the ferry. "We've got a good long ride ahead of us. We'll follow the bay east until we can hit the river, but that's at least two days out. It should be smooth going, provided we keep a low enough profile."
Detaching her canteen from her pack, Sanderson fills it up at the falls, dropping a small white tablet inside afterwards, stoppering the canteen and shaking it up. "You probably want to refill yours too while we're here. The water might have God knows what in it, but I've got a few water purification tablets in my pack. One for each of us, so we'd best make it last…"
Standing up straight, Sanderson looks out towards the boat and Candy atop it, shaking her head slowly as she starts to make the trek around the lagoon's shore towards the vessel.
Candy looks at them all, as she eats for a couple of moments enjoying the peacefulness of the baot. Though she does notice the look at the arm. "How's that wound doing," Candy calls out to Sanderson while she sits there cross-legged. Munching on more food as she remains high and dry on the boat. "I could speed us along on the boat, make a nice little current," she murmers to herself. Her eyes heading back over towards Claire while she sits there, and she starts humming another little song to herself, before she lightly starts to sing:
Iiiiiits a small world after all.
Gabriel, also, wanders his attention on over towards where Sanderson is inspecting her wound. It takes him a few seconds, before he grudgingly states; "I can redress that for you when we get going. What are our plans for locating Ruskin?" He's getting to his feet, picking up his gun and checking it before slipping it back into his holster. Comms device is replaced, jacket scooped back up and shaken free of dirt and at least one insect that goes flipping off into a bush. It's pulled back on as he turns towards Sanderson, looking down a prominent nose at her from beneath a serious brow. Soft singing from Candy's direction slightly ruins the intensity, as much as it's never quiet in the jungle anyway.
Something suddenly hits the humid air, crashing up out of the trees and flying headlong onto the surface of the boat relatively at Candy's feet. Plunk. All she really needs to know is that is brown, furry, about the size of a rabbit, and is obviously deceased.
"I told you. If you must sing, d'no'sing songs tha'drive th'rest of us more crazy than we already are." Huruma doesn't need a com to be audibly reprimanding. The woman stalks out of the woods near from where the dead lemur was tossed, somewhat closer to where the boat has been tied; barefoot and bare-legged, her tank-top certainly does not fall far enough to be considered full cover, though at least there is something besides the shirt. She does not seem to consider it an issue, as she is more occupied with a second brown lemur and one of the small packs hanging from her other hand. Huruma gives Sanderson and Gabriel a moment's squint as she returns to the campsite proper, dropping the objects in her hands onto the ground where the dirt has been smoothed flat- likely where she slept, not too far from Claire.
"If you want to redress that, I suggest doing it on th'boat. T'longer we stay here, th'more chance tha'someone will come." She now does the same shake that Gabriel did with his jacket- with the pants she left over the pack.
Busying herself with at least changing damp socks for dry ones, Claire nods slowly. "Well.. I guess it's better then walking." She tugs her boots back on, after shaking out anything that decided to take up residence and crunching them under the heel of her boot. As she tugs the laces tight, she glances over at the boat and Candy on it already. Brows lift slightly at the song she sings. "Gabriel…" She glances over at the man she considers her nemesis, and asks rather nonchalantly. "Got anything to stopping her singing?"
As Huruma arrives, she gets to her feet finally. Claire stomps her feet to settle them in the boots better before pulling on her pack and moving to copy Sanderson's actions at the falls, moving along side her for one of the tablets. "What can we expect to get hit with along the way?" Not what might they get hit with… what will they get hit with. She leans a bit to look at the lemur. "Your going to eat that?" Her tone flat as she glances back at Huruma.
Halfway to the boat, Sanderson seems lost in thought, holstering her pistol and making certain her canteen is secured to her pack. Behind her, in the direction of the jungle, movement in the underbrush comes with a strong gust of wind. "I'm fine," Sanderson tersely spits back to Candy, trudging down to waist depth in the water until she can grab a hold of the rope netting on the side of the vessel and pull herself up. The process is harder than it looks, with one good hand, but Sanderson seems far too proud to ask for help. By the time she's struggled her way up to the deck of the ferry, she swings her pack off to the wooden deck with a heavy clunk.
Looking down to Gabriel from the boat, Sanderson shifts to one knee and offers out her good hand to help Gabriel up from the shore, not thinking about his own capabilities to the contrary. "Ruskin is on her own right now. There's no telling where she went, but we didn't find a body — so that's at least promising. Once we get to Mandritsara, we can see if the MLF have heard or seen anything. Without her GPS from the comm, Ruskin is a needle in a haystack right now. As far as what we find on the river… hopefully nothing. If we're unlucky, more riverboat patrols. Thankfully we have Allard with us."
It's not Sanderson that Gabriel's attention is clearly on either. Something in the treeline, a ping on that psychic sonar that doesn't fit to where Huruma is standing. It's moving, every heartbeat of psycholocation drawing it nearer and nearer — maybe it's a lemur. Huruma feels the taste of fear a moment later, the pulse of heady adrenaline surging behind the instinctual sense of self-preservation, like the scent of blood on the wind.
The bushes rustle, branches snapping and popping as something charges through the undergrowth on the forest edge where just yesterday team Bravo had entered the lagoon. Sanderson even hears it now, her eyes going wide and hand moving swiftly down to her side to withdraw her pistol in that off-handed grip. An anxious look is fired towards Gabriel, then back to the treeline as whatever is rapidly approaching camp draws closer.
Candy turns as her singing falls flat thanks to the sound of something rather large starting to come through the brush. "Oh my, isn't this just /exciting/," she says as she waits to see what it is. She leans forward over the railing, waiting and watching. Maybe it'll be something fun like an elephant, or unfun like a tiger. Regardless, with their combined powers, its not like it'll really last all that long if it starts attacking. It'll probably get bullet holes, rain holes, whatever-Sylar-does holes..
Slinging his backpack onto his shoulders, strapping it into place, Gabriel casts Claire a glance, and then over to Candy. He allows a smirk to curl the corners of his mouth, and states, simply, "Yes." But whatever it is, he doesn't put it into practice, lacing up his boots before moving to follow the Marine, listening.
Abilities or no, Gabriel doesn't shrug off the more mundane solutions when offered. Levering himself up onto the boat with Sanderson's help, having collected his things together, he listens with as much attention as he can afford when there's something— niggling—
He swivels that look around some moments before Candy reactions, Sanderson's words falling on deaf ears as his eyes go a slightly blank look, a peep through the eyes of another before he snaps back into himself. As much as he has a hand raised in preparation to do what sylars do, his other hand goes out to indicate the others. "Hold fire," is lowly spoken advice, curiousity measured in the intent focus of his expression.
Run. Thought's been in his head since he started nearly an hour ago in a thunderous muffle of loose black earth and singing shrapnel, dark-skinned captors ruptured and slopped into the air like so much warm cherry cobbler. Run.
Wet leaves slap at his chest, black BDUs stripped down to the bare essentials. T-shirt, trousers. Boots. Steel tags rattle around his neck, catching at the same low-slung branches that claw at the leading prow of his face and tear at his shoulders. Blood's mixed with sweat, sweat's mixed with grime, grime's imbued with grit that grinds between clenched teeth and glistens dull against cloying humidity.
His handcuffs have been wrested around from back to front long before he spills out into the rush of running water at the lagoon's edge, in clear view of Team Bravo's camp and boat. One muddy boot catches, trips, slips — he goes down hard in white water up to his knees before he can shove and thrash back up onto his feet.
Then he sees him, and they see him: One skull-faced, cagey, fuzzybald and bewildered white man trapped in handcuffs and one hell of a jungle. Fog rolls away from the water spilling off him in sheets while he stares, pale eyes wide and lungs wheezy while black and bloody runoff stains familiar letters wrought deep into metal tags. Danko, Emile.
Candy stares at Danko as she realizes who it is. Her eyes narrow, and she says, "Let me off this goddamn boat, I'm gonna kill that sonovabitch." She glares daggers at the man who is ultimately responsible for what she did to many evolved in New York City while a part of Humanis First. She jumps out of the boat, and lands with a slight splash on the water as she begins to advance towards the hand-cuffed man. She wants to be close to him when he meets his demise.
"Better f'me than those'orrible packages. I'll be needing t'skin th" Huruma's answer to Claire is much less tense than it would be if she were one of the others- perhaps Huruma has started emotionally leaning towards Claire already for some reason. It sounds like it. Physically, she is yanking up her belted olive pants before shoving her feet into her boots- all up until the flicker of fear crops up on her radar.
A growl bubbles up in her throat next, then a snarl on her face; anger, for the most part- any predator's reaction to being caught with their pants down(in this case, pulling them on). Huruma reels on her boots to face the oncoming presence coming through the woods, all to familiar with what feels human and what feels primitive- the hope that lies in the sense of self-preservation gives it away like a neon light.
But even before the source comes falling out of the jungle, Huruma's expression changes visibly; irritation goes to puzzlement, snarling, growling moments flip like a switch into something that actually looks like surprise.
Finally, she laughs- a drawling laugh that echoes out of her chest and mouth, wide-grinned, smiling- her arms open in a most welcoming gesture. "Emile! Welcome to th'party!"
Starting out into the water after Sanderson, she pauses in thigh deep water as the sound of rustling reaches Claire's ears. The rifle is swung off her shoulder and gripped tightly in both hands as she turns towards the direction of the sound. Her shoulders tighten with tension as she lift the butt of the rifle to her shoulder. Blue eyes narrow to scan the bushes, they widen a bit as she hazards glancing at Gabriel at his order, just in time for a man to come crashing out of the jungle. Blonde brows lift high on her head, before her eyes narrow dangerously… but she doesn't shoot… a part of her wants too though.
Huruma's laugh pulls Claire out of her thoughts and she gives the tall dark lady a surprised look. Her eyes go back to Danko and she eyes him with a small frown. Turning away from the handcuffed man, the tiny blond moves to climb into the boat. Looking at Sanderson, she blandly comments, while she settles her backpack on the deck. "There is your new meat shield." There is a pause as she looks back at Danko. "At least for one fight."
"Allard!" Comes the shout from Sanderson, "Stay back!" All the Lieutenant can do from the boat is bark out her order, pistol leveled up at shoulder height as she stalks towards the front of the ferry. Squinting against the falling rain, Danko's countenance draws a look of overwrought horror from Sanderson, but at the same time strange levels of relief. "Lieutenant Danko!" She calls out, looking back to the direction of the jungle he just came from. Somehow, there's still a vein of tension running through the other ranked officer here as she assesses the handcuffed man.
"Star!" Sanderson calls out, her gun trained not on Candy but Emile. There's a disconcerted look in her eyes, jaw squared. "Star or I will shoot!" Blue eyes flit up to the jungle, then back down again. She can't be certain that it isn't just Danko's face.
Danko? Gabriel stares at the small man coming crashing into the lagoon, disjointed recognition making his mind turn over easy, because even from here, Gabriel knows Emile had grey eyes like his brows as Douglas sharply recalls every detail, filtering them into Gabriel's own memory bank as if it were his own. The smile that writes itself on the serial killer's face has nothing to do with the here and the now, crooked and dog-stupid like the man who'd been under the Hunter's command.
It wipes away in the next moment as the jungle comes back into being around the sound of Candy splashing her way towards him. "I said, hold fire," is growled out, a hand going out. The hydrokinetic is not yanked back by telekinesis, but instead, her own legs are stolen from her control, along with her arms, puppetry repelling her back towards the boat, or at least, away from Danko.
Hunched rigid in the push and stir of foggy water 'round his wiry hocks once he's stumbled another half step to secure his center of balance, Emile looks from face to face with all the tangible, bristling unease of a cornered dog. Even Huruma's bright, open-armed greeting can only coax forth a baffled squint and a glance down at himself in some kind of physical manifestation of a sanity check.
Star, star. Star. He blinks hard, colorless eyes squeezed shut against blood tarring brown at his vision and line of thought alike. There are people here who want to kill him. Their voices whirl around with the rest, mixing with the static fuzz that ripples in his ears.
"Whiskers," wheezed after a minute that feels more like ten, he looks a little helplessly back to Huruma, and then the Midtown Man, who's telling people not to shoot him. Christ, this got big. "Whiskers."
Huruma's finger is trailing over her bottom lip in thought, once Sanderson calls out to Danko. Her field of perception is at its fullest, keeping track of the surrounding presences like any good cat. Her tongue cleans at the edge of teeth while she stoops to grab up the packs, eyes remaining bright and focused on the ex-ex(?) marine that has stumbled literally right into them.
"Can we keep him?" Huruma's head cocks towards Sanderson, and it is obvious by now that her mood has changed quickly.
Moving to stand along side Sylar, Claire watches Danko with curiosity, a frown tugging down a corner of her mouth, "Why hold? He deserves what he gets really." Her words are soft and bitter, but she sighs softly and moves to slip the strap of her rifle over her shoulder again. "Though, what I'd like to know is why he's here in this place and not locked away."
Huruma's comment actually gets a somewhat amused look and Claire is quick to state, "If we do.. I'm not walking him."
Satisfied with the response, Sanderson clicks the her sidearm's safety in place with her thumb and exhales a tired sigh as she looks over at Huruma, then just nods her head in quiet acquiescence. "Seems like most of you recognize him. This is Lieutenant Emile Danko, first-string Bravo Team." A side-long look is afforded to the darkly-dressed soldier. "Gray, get the cuffs off of him and help him aboard." Blue eyes divert to Huruma, she doesn't even want to know how they know each other.
"Lieutenant Danko is with us! Bennet, keep eyes on the perimeter. Allard!" She looks down over the edge of the boat. "Keep yourself under control or I will take your advice to heart. Help Bennet watch our perimeter and get your ass back on this boat."
Holstering her sidearm, Sanderson stays at the front of the ferry, watching the survivor of the original Bravo team with a look of disbelief on her face. "Danko," she offers to Claire, "led the original team into the jungle. The one we lost contact with…"
Candy lets out a sudden cry as she gets tossed back, and she lands on the surface of the water with a thud. Though, its more like a gym mat then anything else. Once she's free to move, she gets back up and glares daggers at Danko. "Yeah, what the hell ever," Candy says, getting into the boat. Her eyes not leaving Danko while she does, before she finally gets her eyes back and moving around the perimeter. "Nice to see that the United States government has no fucking standards when it comes to handing out pardons," she idly notes.
Climbing off the boat to move along the coast of the lake rather than flail his way through the water, Gabriel watches Candy in his periphery— and then has to pause to stop and deal her an incredulous look. The laughter that ensues is brief and breathy, scratching out of his throat and easing between revealed white teeth, and it dies just a few seconds later, humour gradually melting as he resumes approaching the gore spattered ex-ex-Marine. Danko is treated to a psychic peek into his physical presence, for a moment Gabriel seeing himself approach through grey eyes.
"He's not hurt," is mildly surprised, reported back towards the others as he goes to snag the chain between Danko's wrists, to pulling him closer and wrists up to inspect. Any attempts at struggle, reeling back, are countered with mild touches of puppetry to still him, although anything more aggressive— well, Gabriel flicks his amber brown gaze over Danko's face, as if daring him to.
"Wha…" It's hard to be snappy with comebacks when you've been running through Madagascar for an hour. Even with his eyes raking coldly after the source of Claire's o-pinion (which doesn't seem all that unpopular from the sound of things) he has to drag in another pair of long breaths before he can ask with all the earnest dismay in the world: "…How old are you?"
There's also relief in the sag of his narrow shoulders and the gradual rest of his heart rate, but it's short-lived at best. Candy recovers from a timely flying lesson and Gabriel Gray soon fills the span he was trying to cast a furtive glance between Huruma and Sanderson in, prompting — yeah. A lurch of imminent resistance that never makes it quite that far, and quick as a knife, Emile's eyes are fixed tired and washed-out, near fish-belly white against Sylar's amber and black. He doesn't so much as twitch, ragged breaths forced out through his sinuses while he puts this through his mental computer and tries not to blink.
"What's our status?"
"Well, no wonder you lost th'first team." Huruma's snipe is a surprise in itself, coming as she takes the packs to the boat. That small one she tosses with the lemur pair is …making noise, though barely audible. "Jus'kidding." She then gives a mock pout over her shoulder to where Gabriel is needed to take the cuffs off. Her lips cannot hold it for long, somehow, and it turns into a pleased little smile.
Candy is the target of her gaze next, eyes shaded by her eyelids. "You speak of standards?" Huruma's short laugh is derisive. "Y'need t'open your eyes an'look around, girl." She turns to watch as Gabriel takes the other man by the cuffs, ready to take them off. Maybe they should just leave them on. Or- "Keep them intact, if you can. They may come in useful."
There is a short nod at the order, even if Claire's eyes don't come off the old guy. His question gets an lop sided smirk. "Old enough to no longer be jailbait, but not old enough to drink legally." That's all the answer he gets, her head instead turns so that she can narrow her eyes at Sanderson.
" Let me guess…. Gave him the same kinda deal as the rest of us? Why am I not surprised?" Her head slowly shakes, her tone flat. She moves to take up a position on one side of the boat, letting Candy take the other. Her eyes scan the jungle around them, the rifle sliding off her shoulder again and made to rest across her arms, "Liz and Richard would shit a brick if they knew, he was here and possibly going free. Course, I can think of a lot of people who'll be a touch upset." Of course, if they are giving a pardon to the Midtown Man, it makes sense they would do the same for Danko. She's not going to be getting much sleep, not that she is resting well anyhow.
One level look is offered to Candy as Sanderson shakes her head and offers a hand out in surprisingly cordial greeting with Danko. "Butter-side down, Lieutenant…" is Sanderson's initial response to Danko, followed by a look across the ferry. "After HQ lost contact with Bravo another team was hastily put together. This crew was selected and I was chosen as team leader. We departed for Analalava and arrived on-target using the storm as over at 11:00 hours. Hostiles knew we were inbound, and a SAM site at the Analalava airport opened fire on us. I think there were anti-aircraft guns too." Pacing down the length of the deck, Sanderson seems to fall right in line without so much as prompting once she's around someone else with military background.
"We proceeded to abandon the aircraft," a nod is given to the remains of the C-130 cargo plane that is strewn about the jungle floor and the lagoon, "and made a hard landing at the drop site. Hostiles were already en-route, local militia from the resistance. We lost the pilot and the nuclear-tech in the air, Corporal Copeland died on the parachute jump. Dixon is missing, and one of the conscripts — Eileen Ruskin — went down with the plane, but we weren't able to find her remains. Her SatCom was south of the plane, no sign of a struggle."
Looking around the deck as she hears the murmurs, Sanderson's eyes narrow. One hand comes up, pointing to Claire. "Terrorist." Then to Gabriel, "Serial Killer," then to Huruma, "Cannibal," she must mean that misunderstanding with Matt Parkman! Then finally to Candy, "Sociopath." Blue eyes narrow as she looks around the vessel again. "There's a reason we're here."
Eyeing back to Danko, Sanderson looks out to the jungle, then back to the pale-faced soldier. "We commandeered this vessel and were planning to continue en-route to Mandritsara to make contact with elements of local resistance. Give me a SitRep on what happened to Bravo-One."
"Yes, I may be a sociopath, but as you pointed out, I'm not exactly a killer," Candy says with a smirk. Then pauses for a moment, before adding, "Well… not in cold blood." Then another pause, before she finally says, "Well, definitely not in life or death situations." 'Lo and behold, there is a third pause. "Ahh, just fuck it. I'm as screwed up as the rest of them," Candy replies with a smirk, as she moves over to find herself a seat. "That one there though," she points a finger at Danko, "Is responsible for the death of more evolved than any other person here, save one. He woulda gotten some more in too, if I hadn't infiltrated the New York City cell, and helped destroy it." She grins at Danko while she sits there, "So many men gone in a flash. It killed your hopes in New York City, didn't it?" Yes, she enjoys taunting the man with the fact that she infiltrated his group. Yes, she very much does.
The concern that maybe Danko should stay cuffed does not cross Sylar's mind, but perhaps it should. He nods his agreement with Huruma and doesn't voice or mention named about how the cuffs could come in handy CANDYCANDYCANDYCANDY but only inspects them for a moment. Then, blood plastered to Danko's own body forms rivulets, tracking up the man's throat, following the slope of his jaw in a strange, tickling caress; winding off into the air in a thin, impossible river to land in Gabriel's palm. Once he has a handful, it directs it down into the lock on one cuff, filling it, before becoming hard and steely.
Click. With a twist, the makeshift key releases the cuff on Danko's right wrist, before Gabriel work's on the other in exactly the same way, slightly more efficient now that he knows that it works. The silver bracelets are flipped off, the blood-clot tools left to fall away as Gabriel jangles the cuffs by the chain and—
Slips them into his pocket. For now, anyway. With a wolfish look up and down the other man, Gabriel shows him his back, and heads back towards the boat. "Save for one," Gabriel agrees, with a sneer that shows teeth. "And that's because, Sanderson, there aren't any remains to find."
"Bravo-One's dead."
Blood thin with water drips slow off the end of Danko's nose; pools cold in the murky pit of one eye socket until it's all drawn off in a creeping series of networked streams. He does an okay job of not looking uneasy, but there's a tremor down the back of his spine that may or may not be related and an involuntary, tweaky jerk at his deltoid that almost certainly isn't. He sniffs a little miserably to himself and looks down away from Huruma's jab, trying hard to ignore that too.
"They're all dead. We were ambushed on the airstrip before we could finish establishing a perimeter. Nerve gas…" He shakes his head, indifferent or otherwise not compelled to elaborate after having paused to watch the cuffs fall away one free clutch at a time. Bony fingers pass only briefly around bruised wrists while he eyes Candy in the wake of Gabriel's retreat, silence unfathomable as the reflective sheen across his silvery gaze. He's one of the last to forge for the ferry.
Those guys from the night before have disappeared- but not for what is pointed out. Huruma finds a place on the boat to sit herself down, moments before Sanderson points at all of them in turn. Her long fingers meet with her strenum, chin lifting out to the side in a falsely affronted gesture. Her lips form the words in a tauntingly slow manner, one leg propping over the other and unraised arm holding her weight as she leans on it. "Now, now, if we're going with lesser evils…
"I could'ave skipped th'lemurs an'th'grubs, you know." The toe of her boot knocks against the pair of dead brown lemurs. She could have made them some delicious Malagasy jerky- it wouldn't be her fault if they assumed it was a lemur. Huruma's attention goes back to Danko now, for lack of better things to observe. She has spent a while now with this group of relative strangers, and so even a familiar, previously absent face is a welcome face. Even Danko's face.
"Come now, let's go. Who's got a bigger knife?" Lemurs, guys, lemurs.
There is no reaction from the tiny blonde when she's pointed to and labeled Terrorist, blue eyes just focus on the finger and then at the woman it's attached too. "Just cause I said people would be upset.. doesn't mean I don't see the irony. It makes sense.. doesn't mean have to like it." Claire knows what she is and knows what she's done, she'll own up to that. Her head turns to watch Gabriel work with Danko's cuffs, with curiosity.
"Really think she made it then?" The ex-cheerleader asks of Sylar as he joins them on the boat. "Or at least might be alive?" Claire sounds like she hasn't decided yet. "Hopefully we'll have some idea in a couple of days."
Turning thoughtful, Claire glances around at all the others and shakes her head, "This is a really fucked up group." She sounds more amused then anything, a smile on her lips as she turns her attention to watch her side of the river.
"Allard." Sanderson's eyes flick back to the young woman. "Put a sock in it before I feed you to Gray. I know the Lieutenant's situation, I didn't go into this blind." Then, under her breath, "Only half-blind." There's a break in Sanderson's stride as she looks from her snap at the young woman towards Danko. Whatever transpired between the two on their watch has not engendered the female soldier to the younger woman at all.
Sweeping a hand over her damp hair, Sanderson closes her eyes when Danko specifies nerve gas and looks up towards Huruma, then over to Danko again. "Alright." There's a clipped quality to that affirmation, bobbing her head into a nod as she moves to the back of the boat, and using her one good arm starts yanking the pull cord for the engine. The boat motor roars to life after a moment, followed by a pluttering noise and a choking puff of black smoke, but it seems to stay running. Exhaling a deep breath that is pushed out as a sigh, Sanderson turns back to Danko.
"We've got about a day on the open water until we hit the river that will take us close to Mandritsara." A wary glance is afforded to Candy, then back to Danko. "Why aren't you dead, and where have you been?" The pointed question is asked as the boat starts to jostle to motion, pushing out from the shore as Sanderson leans on the long steering pole at the back of the ferry, indicating towards the bench seats that rest on the aft and port sides under the shanty roof for the others to sit down on.
As the boat starts to move, it does so by plunging headlong into the thick fog. Fog that both serves to mask the ferry's approach, but also hide obstacles in the wide river ahead. Tiredly leaning on the steering pole, Sanderson watches the fog parting ahead as they move downriver.
Candy leans back and says, "Aww… was just havin' a spot of fun with the fucker." She shrugs her shoulders, and leans back against the boat, she doesn't close her eyes though, not tired enough. But she watches what's going on now with a bit of an interest. And at Sanderson's prompting of why isn't Danko dead yet, Candy just quips, "I can fix that for you, you know. Wouldn't be too hard."
"I think Vanguard are tough to kill," Gabriel says in response to Claire, moving to thud his backpack down onto the wooden deck, sniff once in a slightly damp and sickly snort of fluid, and smooth his fingers through his hair, pushing it back off his forehead - not that his hands are any cleaner. He angles a look towards Sanderson, and then back to Claire. "Even the little skinny girls who talk to birds. We probably would have found a body by now, too."
He stomps his heavy-footed away towards the benches between the shanty roof, resting his elbows against his knees and letting his eyes droop closed for a moment. He smells like blood and river and not enough sleep. Then, Gabriel swivels a look to Huruma, and has to ask, "You know, if you don't want your MREs…"
"No." The woman's reply comes without missing a beat. With the medium sized knife that Huruma does have, she takes from her belt, and then lifts up the first poor creature by the tail; her legs unwind again and she sits with her ankles crossed. The lemur's head rolls limp, neck broken. Senses remain perked, semi-scanning the fog ahead. As for the dead thing she is now maneuvering around her lap, it does not take Huruma long to settle into the long-standing motions of skinning it whole and removing the tail once its body is bare of hide. In that she also says very little in the process, it can be mesmerizing knifework for the ones who watch.
"Please, Allard, put a sock in it." Huruma shares Danko's- and probably everyone else's- sentiments.
"You worried, Lieutenant?" Steadier on his feet now that he's had plenty of time to catch his breath and take a measure of precisely how much loathing he's dealing with from his compadres here, Danko sizes Sanderson up sidelong at closer range. She's shorter than him, if not by much. So's Claire, but odds are she's not exactly inclined to buddy up close enough for him to relish it.
In any case, there's nothing past slithering, reptilian confidence in the cool wind of his eyes over her face, already searching deliberately around for cracks. Frailties. The absence of feeling (save maybe for amusement at her expense) that accompanies likely does more to unsettle than it does to reassure. His brows tick up on a delay, politely inquiring. There's also the fact that he hasn't answered her yet. Like, at all. "What's the mouthy one do?"
"Yeah.. us little skinny girls are hard to kill. People underestimate us." Claire comments with a little smirk, glancing up at her nemesis and briefly to Danko, arches a brow as she catches him looking at her. Her eyes drift back to Gabriel watching him move to sit, "Well.. if you think your lot is that hard to kill then I imagine we'll find her." Claire pulls her back pack close to her and unzips it so that she can dig into its content.
There is a thump as an MRE lands at Gabriel's feet, one other shortly follows, "You can have my corn beef and hash ones. They all suck.. but those I just can't stand." She gives him a tight lipped smile, before her attention is drawn what Huruma is doing. Her head tilts a bit as she watches the dark woman's skill with a knife.
"You look at this situation and reconsider that question of if I'm worried, Danko." Sanderson swallows awkwardly, wincing as she moves her bandaged shoulder the wrong way. "Here," she notes to the shorter man, "take the helm for a bit. Just steer us in the middle of the river, keep an eye out for deadfall or debris." Blue eyes drift over to Candy, then back to Danko.
"Huruma's…" Sanderson looks at Huruma for a moment, then sharply looks away once she realizes what the woman is doing. "Huruma's an empath," there's a not of the Lieutenant's head to the tallest person here. "She can sense emotions out to a good distance, strong survival skills, familiar with the terrain." Her focus darts to Claire. "Regenerator, she's taken fire from mounted weaponry and gotten back up and dusted herself off. Decent with a rifle too." Then her focus falls on Gabriel. "Genius intelligence, swiss-army knife of powers. He pulls rabbits out of his hat." Down the line she finally goes to Candy, hesitating before turning to look back to Danko again. "Allard is a hydrokinetic, manipulates water. She's in her environment, I guess." There's a somewhat warning look from Sanderson as she slips away from Candy and surprisingly makes her way towards Gabriel, leaving the question of Danko's survival up in the air… for now.
"I'd… like to take you up on your offer." The Lieutenant offers quietly, nodding to her bandaged arm and shoulder. "I think it might be getting infected. It started itching today. We don't have shit for medical supplies. I'm hoping we'll hit a village on the way. Ruskin was supposed to be our backup medical officer."
Candy continues to lean back and comfortable before she tells Sanderson, "Sugar, I ain't shown you half of what I can do yet." She smirks, before looking back at Gabriel considering. Taking a moment, she says, "Hey, Gabriel, right? I got a question. Can you do anything with blood?" Yes, gears are working in Ms. Allard's head, especially of Gabriel can do fun things with blood.
Hey food. Gabriel looks at Claire, and deems a 'thank you' to probably fall like ash from his tongue and dead on her ears. Instead, he just scoops up the packets and turns them over, before Sanderson is making her way on over. He doesn't hesitate, just nods and tilts his head to indicate that she should sit down next to him. His hands move to undo her bandages, flicking a look to Huruma and her gory display, and then over towards Candy.
Raising an eyebrow, he focuses on Sanderson's injury even as he answers her, "Yes. I do things with blood. I can move it like you move water, harden it, manipulate it in my own body, pull it out of someone and shove it back in again. It's very painful. Why do you ask?"
Candy looks over at Gabriel as she says, "Well, if you can do that… I can make their blood explode out of them by forcing the water in their bodies to suddenly… leave. You think you could make small daggers from the pink mist, and… make them go kill more enemies?" She looks at Gabriel while she sits there in the boat, honestly curious, and loving the possibility if he can.
"Is this some sort of role call?" Huruma drawls during the middle of Sanderson's avoidance of watching lemurs getting served up. One more thing to her credit, Huruma does have the normalcy at the moment to slice the stomachs open off the side of the boat into the water. Little bursts of lemur guts float along downstream with the boat, though shadows are already creeping around underneath the pooling of stale blood.
"I don'suppose you'ave fire in there? Or, I suppose, lightning- ah- 'nuke' takes on a non-microwave meaning now, hmmmm?" Huruma smiles almost pleasantly, looking over the skins before deciding to toss them both with a flick over the edge of the boat.
Claire glances over at Sanderson and Danko as the group's abilities are revealed, not exactly comfortable with him knowing really. Not much she can really say about it. Instead she rests the rifle across her lap and works at pulling her hair up into a tight blond ponytail. As her hands tug her hair, she glances over at Huruma. "Is Lemur any good?" She looks unconvinced really, but maybe it'll be better then those god awful MREs.
If you ask a Fossa, the answer is very much yes.
Nearly twenty minutes pass down the river, with Danko piloting the noisy puttering ferryboat across mostly calm waters. The falling rain ceases for the first time in a day, not even a drizzle now, just the dense and cool fog contrasting against the thick, humid air and buzzing of mosquitos that seem more relentless on the water. Seated on the bench by Gabriel's side, the redressing of Sanderson's arm revealed an uncomfortable truth in the tender, reddened and swollen places where the two puncture wounds she received in the crash have indeed gotten infected from sweat and dirt. Cleaning the wound — almost like a medieval bleeding of the wound — with Gabriel's hemokinesis can only do so much.
With a new makeshift bandage being applied from the scraps of cloth retrieved from the village of Analalava, Gabriel's focus is split between the unexpected job of medical care — to which Kazimir Volken would be forever amused — and the distorted ping of his psycholocation due to the close proximity of everyone aboard the ferry. It's Huruma's shorter range emotion sensing that picks up something moving too quick to be stationary, opposite of the ferry's movement down river. The immediate presence of dozens of thinking minds creates the sensation of an impressionist painting. At the speed the other minds are moving, by the time Huruma's registered the feelings they've erupted through the fog. Larger and more sturdily built, another river plying ferry does nothing to avoid the head-on collision with its smaller, wooden counterpart.
The boats collide with a tremendous force, knocking Sanderson off of her feet and down onto her back, sending her gun skidding out from her unbuttoned holster and sliding across the deck. A yelp of shock comes from her as the wooden front of the ferry shatters against the metal bow of the larger boat. The collision causes wooden planks on the front of the larger boat to jerk free of where they were resting, sliding down and forward to collide with the deck of the now entangled ferry.
Shock immediately becomes the consensus among the many minds, followed by that surge of adrenaline that tastes like blood on the wind again. A scream of warning in Malagasy comes, followed by the first humanoid figure rushing to the front of the larger ferry. A muscular man dressed in a sleeveless camouflage BDUs steps to the bow of the ship, pistol held out and dark eyes peering down. It only takes a moment for him to realize these aren't his comrades, and the hollered cry back to the others on the boat.
Well, that's what Sanderson gets for letting Danko drive.
Trouble.
And he hasn't even had time to petition for a firearm yet. He's back out on the deck in a foggy smudge, black misting to grey, visibility nearly at nil while he skids to a halt and attempts to register just what the fuck they hit out in the middle of a goddamn river. Turns out it's a bigger boat full of angry Malagasy neanderthals, which just about figures.
Somehow — call it a sixth sense — he manages to register the gun that goes skidding in the thick of everything else, and after a wavery second spent sizing up the local hollaring on their bow, disregards it. He sets back into a sprint instead, not for the guy but past him, splintered wood and join of boat to boat cleared in a leap that begins more gracefully than it ends. There's a crash on the other side, admist more shouting.
Yeah, Gabriel had told Candy, and for the first time, the woman had been rewarded with a smile even, the kind that glimmers when predators have the same grin. I could do that. And maybe, soon, there will be opportunity to test it. Gabriel doesn't quite land face first as he had on the plane when the boats collide, jostled with the shudder but managed to grab onto the edge at the moment of impact, mouth pulling back into an almost inhuman snarl.
It never ends.
Gabriel has a gun at his belt too, but he doesn't go for it. A hand is extended, and rather haphazard, without any kind of visual or audible cue, the man reels back as if receiving a blow to the head, but it's more of a swat than Gabriel intended, distracted by the sight of the tiny soldier man disappearing off towards the other boat. Well. It's his suicide. Not that Gabriel can really talk.
When Huruma eventually feels that nearing senstation, her first move is to drop whatever she might be handling in exchange for the rifle slung around on her back. She has it in her grip when the boats collide in the river, the shock of the impact leaving her trying to stay on her feet- which means hopping on one heel for a step or two first. Her body finds something to lean on, thankfully before she tips over the edge as well. It puts her in the relative frontal sights of the man peering down at the smaller boat.
Her eyes meet his long enough to allow him to see her, and her teeth that now bare themselves with a now familiar and angry snarl of air. She gives him enough time to register her before he yells- just before he gets a crippling wave of fright sloshing wildly down the length of his mind, her rifle lifting.
She doesn't shoot. Yet. Because she is moving after Danko, up the crumbling front of the smaller boat and aiming to ascend to the larger. Maybe there's more of a reason than- you know- action hero mode. Such as the fact the boat now has a giant hole in it. Worry about what's not alive later, because it's only a matter of time before something sinks.
"Oh… sh….." That's about all Claire gets out before she's thrown forward onto her stomach, as the boats come together. The rifle ends up a short distance away from her, so Claire scrambles to crawl quickly to retrieve it in preparation of becoming the decoy again. Once it's in hand, she moves to climb to her feet quickly, though just in time to see a person flash by her and watch Danko disappear into the fog as he leaps to the other boat. "Whoa…" The petite blond manages to say, with a touch of awe. "Not bad for an old guy."
Hell no she's not letting him show her up like that, so she picks up her pack and throws her pack on before making the leap for the boat, not long after Huruma. Grabbing the bow of the boat, one of her legs splash through the water, but she ignores it as she pulls herself up into the boat. Her rifle swings up at the ready as she looks for the squishy old man and the bad guys.
Oh look, bigger boat! Candy grins, and then frowns, its too big for her to pull the same trick again. Oh well, she thinks, as she decides to whip up a new surprise. Making sure that her own comrades are water repellant for the moment, including Danko. Though, she could just put that off as an accident… But, nope, he's protected as well. She swings her arm up, a colomn of water going up with it, before she starts tossing with her hand. Its reflected in the water, as tiny, sharp, painful water darts begin to rain down upon the ship.
More minds are moving, a different vector than the ones on the boat, and Huruma can now make out the distinct sounds of another — smaller — engine moving down the river. Out of the fog, a canoe-sized motorboat skims along the water's surface, one man armed with a belt-fed assault rifle kneels at the front, opening fire onto the deck of the ferry, while another shouts out a half-heard warning to the crew on the boat. Huruma's heard it before, the call of Devils. The gunfire from the SAW tears apart the wooden side of the smaller ferry, sending whizzing rounds whipping through the fog, shattering some of the upright supports of the shanty roof.
Laying as flat as she can on the deck, Sanderson reaches out in a futile gesture for her pistol, eyes wrenched shut as she tries to grab the too-far-away gun without putting herself in harm's way. The motorboat circles around behind the smaller ferry and slows down, the pilot of it pulling out a pistol as he opens fire, sending a round slamming into Sanderson's vest as soon as she gets up and knocking her back up against the wooden railing that was pulverized by the SAW. Miraculously, it holds her sleight weight.
From the deck of the larger boat, screaming and wild gunfire can be heard as Claire and Huruma make their way up. Two men already lay dead in Danko's path, blood trailing from them where they lay on the ground, clutching at tiny puncture wounds all over their bodies from the razor sharp water Candace called up from the depths. One man stands between him and the furthest visible on the deck, one bringing an AK-47 up to bear towards the bald ex-marine, even as blood runs down his face from the razor-water. The furthest man away and out of the spray of bladed water on the wide open deck holds what looks like a shotgun at a distance, but it erupts with a noisy foomp and a loud pressurized hiss of a grenade launcher.
A canister trailing a thin vapor from it arcs over Danko's head and with a clatter-clank of a metal lands in a wild spin on the deck of Bravo's ferry. "Shit! Shit!" It's all Sanderson can say, recalling Danko's story of the nerve gas, but there's no way they'd fire it so close.
On the deck of the militia boat, three men emerge with AK-47s out on the arched roof at the front of the cabin, firing wildly down towards Danko, Claire and Huruma. The thick fog serves as a perfect obscurement for their shots, however, at least for the moment. Not more than ten feet away from Danko, the man who fired the canister throws the grenade-launcher aside and whips out a combat knife, brandishing it in the air menacingly. He clearly has no idea who he's trying to intimidate.
Getting up to her feet, Sanderson scrambles for her gun and seizes a hold of it. The gas has a strange, sweet smell to it, salty like blood and strangely filmy on the skin. It stings the eyes, but not enough to be a deterrent like tear gas. A biohazard symbol on the canister, though, visible in yellow and red blur, can't be a good sign.
Opening fire onto the smaller motorboat, Sanderson manages a lucky shot that sends the boat's driver down into the river with a yelp. "Allard! Drown him!" She sweeps her gun towards the man firing the SAW, but her 9 millimeter rounds flatten against the body armor he's wearing.
As the gas from the canister fills the sundered ferry with its haze, a horrifying realization falls first on Candy and then soon after Gabriel. It first starts out like a mild headache, onset quickly, but soon turns into a strange burning sensation on their skin and under it. A moment later, the true terror sets in when Candy cannot feel the river and the mist in the fog, and Gabriel suddenly — and terrifyingly — feels all too human.
That's how the Vanguard performed the genetic cleansing here.
They developed an aerosol neurotoxin.
Danko considers himself to be a pretty resilient and resourceful guy. 5'7" sure, but an optimist would say the Government's getting more bang for its buck. In any case, there's a glowery guy pointing an AK-47 at him and duck-duck-goose claps of air pressure changes ticking holes into the deck all around his boots.
Bare hands lifted carefully towards his shoulders, he ticks the barest of uncertain looks past the larger man's side, calculating for something the gun wielder can't see.
Then he lunges in low, fleet on his feet across the blood-slick deck in shoving Mr. Assault Rifle through towards Mr. IDK Guys I Have A Knife. His right hand finds purchase on the rifle itself mid-struggle, forcing the barrel up hot towards the guys upstairs right around the time the trigger depresses.
Gabriel has too many powers not to miss them when they're gone. The first thing he feels is his heart rate beginning to speed up, as much as he'd been controlling it to a normal pace when he was able. The second thing is that he doesn't vanish into a cloud as smoky as the gas, if thicker and black as tar, when he tries to will it to be so. After two long strides, the toe of his boot catches the canister, sending it skittering over the edge and into water, even as his hand now goes for the pistol at his side.
It won't be the first time he'd thankful for the arms training he received when he ran with wolves. He can hope it will be the last. Boiling anger over Evolved castration, as it were, in combination with his low headache, Gabriel hits the deck when a spray of bullets is sent their way.
It takes some time and struggle to find a vantage point that won't get him shot, the shanty roof used as some cover from the bigger boat before he turns his attention towards the smaller motorboat and the assault rifle making a mess of their brand new river ferry. The blam blam blam of his pistol is measured, managing not to just shoot wildly as he tries to clip a head shot if possible. The sound of the AK-47 going off gets a glance, but it only confirms that the guys on the other boat will probably be a little distracted.
Huruma lands solidly on the deck of the ferryboat behind Danko, taking her time now in putting the rifle to her shoulder and reasserting each presence in her mind. Gun at the ready, it takes the woman seconds to be ready when she stalks forward over the boat, the barrel of her gun lifting at an angle towards where she can recognize the rise of shadow on the largest boat.
Metallic echoes pepper through the gray at that lifted angle. Though her shots are measured, Huruma is firing as much into the fog as the men taking potshots; her main advantage is being able to see where the high ground begins and sense where each man stands firing- they only have the sounds of muffled boots to go by, and the other sounds of bullets that are so numerous- it is unlikely that the ones directly below can be made out before they cause the intended damages.
With Danko on the job the petite blonde turns at the sound of the SAW littering the deck of the smaller boat. A glance goes to those still on board and she frowns a bit… why are they not doing anything. Claire hurries to the side of the boat, a foot resting on the side of the boat, she brings up her rifle and starts firing at those bad guys with the SAW. Standing in plain sight she hopes at least to draw the fire of the men on the third boat, it's what she's good for. The sharp crack of her rifle's report continues steadily as she tries to hit anything vital.
Candy flails around as that burning sensation rolls over her, and she realizes that her connection with the water is fading. "You fucking sons a bitches," Candy says, as her hands alight on a pistol. Oh god. Wrapping her hand around it, it suddenly goes off into the side of the boat, missing folks. Candy flinches, but there isn't enough time to say oops, or to really apologize for it. Relaxing her grip on the pistol, she brings it up and pointed towards the boat with the SAW and folks on it. She just starts squeezing the trigger, her aim all over the place as she sprays the boat with that little pistol's clip. The scream or two that accompany it, let her know she's at least hitting /something/.
Combined firepower typically bests any armored opponent. When Gabriel begins firing at the soldier using that gigantic assault rifle from the boat, the evasive maneuvers he slowly takes manage to put him into a better position for attackers he is unaware of. Candy's blind fire does little other than serve as additional distractions, one round that does hit home mushrooms out against the hardened plates of his body armor. True to form for an inexperienced hand with a gun, and also evident in the shooting pain in Candy's wrist after firing the handgun with an improper grip. Thankfully, one of Gabriel's well-trained rounds grazes the side of his head, causing him to jerk back and away, followed by a flash of red from his throat as Claire's burst-fire from the AK-47 tears through his throat, sending him toppling out of the motorboat along with his machine-gun.
On the deck of the ship, the two men in front of Danko collapse upon each other like the tragic ending of a Greek love story. Huruma's firing from the deck of the larger boat sends bursts of rounds from her AK up into the sharpshooters. Thankfully still in possession of her ability, Huruma's ability to pinpoint conscious minds aids in her aiming when vision fails. After three short bursts, one by one the sharpshooters fall, two with crashes into the water, one with a meaty snap as he lands on his neck on the deck of the ship.
Looking at Gabriel, not quite aware yet of what the gas did, Sanderson sees water filling up the smaller boat. Feverishly moving, she grabs Claire's pack with her good arm, mistaking it for her own as she rushes up the fallen planks and broken wood onto the larger boat. Slipping in the blood everywhere on deck, her eyes go wide as she looks around, and realizes that the thundering noise she hears isn't gunfire, but the rapid-fire beating of her own heart.
Nearly out of breath and staggered from the round her vest took, Sanderson drops Claire's pack and looks back down to the ferry, holstering her gun and offering out a hand to Gabriel and Candace. "Climb up! It's going under!" Because, from what she can hear from her vantage point, anyone who had a grudge with Bravo team is bleeding to death.
Un holstered, Gabriel moves for where his own pack is discarded, and, goddamnit, he takes about three seconds to push Claire's MREs into the backpack also before slinging it over his shoulder and bolting for the larger boat. A leap has feet kicking over the water beneath him, gripping onto Sanderson's hand but truly, his own momentum has both himself and the Marine almost crumpling to the deck.
He staggers away from her, shaking his head as if he were a dog that gotten stung, before sending a furious glare Sanderson's way. "And none of you people had intel about— " A glance back towards where Danko might be, jaw coming to set closed, before quieter, he hisses to her, "That was a negation drug. The canister. You really better hope you knew nothing about it."
And with that, he's storming off. To who knows where. Away from Sanderson, and likely everyone else.
With what she stuffed inside, Huruma is confident they will be able to fish her pack off of the river later. For now, she pauses stock-still on the boat, silently testing the air with all six senses given her. The last feet hit the deck around her, footsteps alighting on wood and those now familiar presences abound. The rifle draws back down, flicked into idleness before it is swung over the dark woman's shoulder again, the strap pressing across her chest.
Huruma is proceeding over the deck when Danko's comment reaches her, and she offers him a slanted smile in return before moving to assist the ex-ex-marine in his looting of guns and bodies. "Ambinina'andro- all clear, Sanderson." Evidently. Oh, Lucky Day. A bigger boat indeed.
Moving to help Sanderson with getting people on the boat, Claire doesn't hear what Gabriel says as she realizes her backpack is on the boat. "Shit," Glancing at he sinking water craft she doesn't spot her pack. Teeth press hard into her lower lip as she moves back from the edge and turns, almost tripping over the pack Sanderson brought. "Oh.. thank god." The blonde declares as she sees her backpack sitting there. Scooping it up, she settles it over one shoulder.
Claire heads away from the Sanderson, glances at Danko as he looks at her, brows lifting just a bit as if asking 'what?' Then, of course, she passes his handy work, this gives her pause. A glance is hazarded behind her, to the old man.
Yeah… He'll fit right in with this group.
"Fucking guns, they're so goddamned barbaric," says the woman who turns people into bursts of blood. Wringing her hand, and wincing, Candy mutters as she grabs her own pack and begins the climb up the boat. Flopping over when she gets there, her eyes go to Sanderson, and she just says to her, "What he fucking said." Yes, she's just as pissed about those canisters as Gabriel is as she moves to find herself a comfortable spot to curl up in and nurse her wrist. "Told them not to let me near a gun," she mutters all the while, "Fucking things," she eyes her wrist some more.
Only when Gabriel explains what the strange sensation Sanderson is experiencing truly is does the horror and realization dawn on her. Looking back to the sinking smaller ferry, she shakes her head in disbelief. "A— An airborne— " Too much at once, too many things happening at the same time. The Lieutenant lets out a ragged, pained sound and looks to her once more bleeding shoulder where she split open her wound. Exhaling a shuddering breath, she turns and looks towards the others who were caught in the explosion of the canister. "I swear, I had no idea… I— General Rasoul must have had it developed. We figured that there was a biological weapons facility somewhere here in Madagascar but— " Wetting her lips, Sanderson shakes her head from side to side. "Christ if they have that…"
Watching the smaller ferry sinking down into the river, Sanderson's legs give out and she drops to one knee, letting Claire's pack fall to the deck in some of the still wet blood. One hand moves to her shoulder, bandages already bright red at the points she was wounded before. The Lieutenant's blue eyes alight to Danko, watching him don the raiments of his fallen foes without so much as a moment's hesitation. She sees now, why he was the Military's first pick: A madman to lead madmen.
"We— " Sanderson huffs, trying to catch her breath. "We have to turn this around and get moving." There's a hitch of her breath, though fearing looking like a wounded animal in front of predators, Sanderson forces herself to her feet shakily. "We need to make the Ankofia river before dawn tomorrow." A few sharp, bobbing nods of her head come as she looks back to the now completely sunken ferry, eyes falling shut, but only for a moment.
She won't show weakness in in front of the predators.