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Abigail pressed her back against pot she was huddled next to, hands clasped over her mouth as the-- as something stomped towards her, whispering endlessly.
Checking the rooms had been such a bad idea. She should have stuck with Zachary. Or Emma. Why had they split up?! She was the dumb character in a horror movie that she liked to gripe about because-- well they hadn't known that! They hadn't known! It had seemed so easy; check the rooms, meet Emma at the security station. It was a short walk. She hadn't expected literal smoke monsters or whatever to be standing in her way.
She couldn't do this. She couldn't. She hadn't seen the-- the thing until she was halfway to the elevators and now she was trapped in a corner between a plant and an overturned cart. The only way to go was right into the whatever-the-the-hell's line of sight. Her only chance was to stay here huddled against the wall with her hands clasped over her mouth as though that would somehow help her stay quiet and hope it wouldn't notice her as it stomped past. It hadn't seen her when she saw it the first time. It was possible. It was. It had to be. She stared at the cart and tried to stay still, not wanting to hold her breath yet in case she needed to stop as it passed. Every time the thing stomped one of the mugs twitched and if it fell, if it attracted the thing's attention...
Somewhere towards the kitchens someone was yelling. Maybe it would be a good idea to get them, if this thing passed her and went further into the halls.
She pressed her hands harder against her face and squeezed her eyes shut, putting everything into not crying. It was so close now. Another step or two and it would be able to see her just by turning its head and she had nothing to do but wait and hope it killed her quickly.
But then it didn't step again. It-- it stopped. Thank god it stopped. And stood there. Breathing or whispering or... Please don't come this way.
Something was apparently with her because when the stomping started again it was heading back towards the elevators, and then it turned towards the entrance, whispers trailing away into silence long before the stomps faded.
Abigail was not going that direction. She was still going to have to figure some way out of Crew Quarters but... maybe there was a maintenance hatch or something? Danielle would know, if they could get her on the transcribe. The stompy thing seemed pretty big and slow, it probably wouldn't fit in one. If it was slow enough, maybe she could outrun it. If she had a path that she knew she could keep moving on... Maybe?
She carefully, inch by inch, edged back on to her feet, freeing one hand from her face to brace against the wall as she slowly stood up. She couldn't hear anything anymore, but from the way the mug was twitching stompy was probably still close. She couldn't stay here. Who knew where it would wander next and if it came back this way... That might be it for her.
At least she knew she wasn't the sort to completely freeze in a literal horror situation. She... could have dealt with never having to find that out.
She forced herself to take a step, then another. The guy across the way was still yelling and it was tempting to dash over there and find him... But what if he was attracting more of those things? She'd said she was going to meet up with Emma and her office was right there. Really, they should have just planned for Abigail to meet her there all along.
Hopefully she was still there. Hopefully she was okay.
Abigail was careful to give the fallen cart a wide berth, not wanting to kick a spoon or something and get herself killed that way. That mug was gonna fall. She was convinced. If this was a movie that barely balanced mug was gonna crash to the ground and she'd either die or it would spawn a chase scene. If this was one of her Fatal Fortress runs... Hopefully it wasn't anything like that. She was mean in those. If she survived this she was never doing another gorey death scene again. It was gonna be all sunshine and rainbows from here on out.
It took forever, each step deliberate and soft. She wasn't exactly tip toeing but she wasn't letting her heels hit the ground either. Sound was her enemy here.
Shoot, what if stompy had been trying to do the same thing. It had been whispering, she couldn't understand what but-- what if he'd been someone like her, trying to sneak around, and then some black mass had stuck to him and now he was still trying to do whatever he'd been last doing. Maybe he'd just been looking for help. Maybe-- no. It wasn't like she could do anything about it without risking some sort of horrible death. Or becoming a stompy thing herself.
Almost there.
Relief flooded into her as she edged into the hallway towards the pool, because that was Emma. She was standing a bit odd and hunched over, hopefully not hurt but, well, if any of her friends could patch up a wound, Emma was it. She was resourceful. They could do this. They'd figure out another way out of this part of the station and then keep to the plan.
"Emma," she whispered. The other woman didn't answer, swaying in place and looking at something down the hallway towards the pool.
Abigail held her breath for a moment, worried that maybe Emma was holding still to avoid being seen by another stompy... but she could hear the one out in the entry way loudly meandering back this direction (she didn't want to think about how they were going to get past it, she didn't want to think about how narrow of a window she'd had to get from her hiding spot to here) and nothing but a slight whirring sound from in the pool room.
"Emma!" she whispered again, more loudly this time as she edged closer to her friend.
Emma swayed, head tilting back unnaturally as she swung around to look towards where Abby was, her face twisting in shock and sorrow the moment she laid eyes on her. "No."
"Emma it's me!"
"Go-- Run. Get-- Get Away. It's-- You can't. I can't. Abby." Emma took a stumbling step towards her, moaning under her breath. "Abby No. Please. I won't!"
And then the whirring thing slid around the corner. A massive tentacled-- a beholder. It was a beholder. She had-- she could only think of the last time she'd thrown one of these at her friends in a campaign. She'd been so gleeful when they'd stumbled on it, so smug. And now there it was. Floating right there. It looked different but that's what it was. A giant white eye in a mass of black and Emma was stumbling towards her whimpering protests for her to run but Abby couldn't run because the stompy guy was out there whispering and she was rooted in place staring at that white eye, falling into it as her thoughts grew more and more frantic and her body felt more and more numb and she couldn't--
Well she couldn't. Couldn't. Anything.
The relief that went striking through Danielle when she felt the vibrations from the pool window made her almost lose her grip on the outside of the station. It was all she could do to check the area for Tython before she slid towards the window. Thank god. Thank god. Abby was alive Abby was--
That was not Abby. That was very much Morgan fucking Yu standing there with a wrench looking vaguely bemused. Danielle's fist hit the glass futilely as she tried to connect their transcribes, looking in vain around the room until she spotted what looked like Abby near the door. And Emma half under a pool chair and Mary with one arm in the water and-- okay. One thing at a time. At least now she knew why Abby hadn't been answering and that answer better be that she was just unconscious. "Morgan," she said as soon as the connection established, trying to keep her voice as calm as possible, "are the people in the room with you still alive?"
"Yeah."
Morgan seemed... Pretty unconcerned for someone who was in the middle of an alien outbreak that she was probably at least partially responsible for. Especially considering Morgan wasn't even supposed to be here. Danielle was a little meanly satisfied that both of the Yu siblings were having to deal with the consequences of their whatever the heck they did. But... Not at Abby's expense.
"There's probably something in first aid up in the office, might be something that can wake them up. I know Emma's combination if you need--"
"Nope. Not from this. They'll be out for awhile. They're... I didn't hit them over the head or anything, it was... different."
What the hell had she done to them?! "Why would you knock them out!"
"A Telepath had them."
Okay that, that explained a lot actually. Why Abby wasn't answering, why Emma was so out of it... Danielle didn't know what the heck a Telepath was, but she could probably guess. Of course Morgan would know. She was probably responsible.
"Look," Morgan continued, "I don't have time--"
"The hell you--"
The infuriating woman interrupted her, "I get why you're concerned but this is really the safest way for them to be right now."
"Face down about to slide into the pool?"
Morgan twisted around and considered Mary for a moment, "Well, she's not in the pool."
"Morgan."
The other woman shrugged at her. "They're safest this way. Mimics won't get them."
Some nerd down in Psychotronics had gotten one over on everyone and had Morgan freaking Yu very seriously using Fatal Fortress names for literal actual aliens.
There were a lot of arguments Danielle could have about what could 'get them', especially with Abby there... But she needed to prioritize. Morgan said they were alive, which meant figuring out what Morgan wanted and getting Morgan to wake Abby up and get her to somewhere safe. Assuming Morgan could even do that. Assuming she wouldn't ditch her the moment she got what she wanted from Danielle. She had to want something. There was no way she was banging on every random window with a wrench which meant she'd accessed Abby's transcribe and now she wanted something from Danielle.
"Alright let's just... figure this out."
"January says--"
"Who?" she demanded. That sure as hell wasn't a name she recognized.
"She's an operator. It's complicated."
Danielle tried not to let her rage drown out Morgan's words as the other woman described what her unlicensed operator was telling her to do. What the fuck. All those arguments, all those long hours of trying to figure out what the hell Morgan was up to and convince Alex to shut the hell up and listen to her and do something about his sister and the fucking relief when Morgan had finally gotten her increasingly erratic ass kicked off the station and-- and now Morgan was just blithely telling her about the operator. Which needed her to go into Deep Storage because of fucking course it did.
Calm. Calm thoughts. This was a giant fucking mess, but Abby was alive and Morgan seemed to both have a plan and the ability to carry it out so she was just going to need to get Abby to stick with Morgan and it would be fine. They could survive this.
She just wouldn't think about all the people who couldn't.
Once Morgan wrapped up her explanation, Danielle sighed, "Okay that sounds... Not terrible. Not sure why you needed an operator to tell you where the plan for something that you created is, but if it can contain the situation then I'm on board." That was... not really her opinion on the matter, her real opinion involved a lot more cursing. "I'm assuming you have a plan for getting the people who're still alive out before one of these things kills them?"
Morgan shrugged, which was infuriating. "I haven't worked it out yet. Elazar has some people holed up in the cargo bay so I'd figured on getting them there somehow."
That was... slightly less infuriating. And maybe worth investigating if there was an un-aliened O2 dispenser between here and there to top up from and Danielle could get close enough to someone's transcribe to connect.
"I can't do anything without your voice code though," Morgan added pointedly.
Yeah, she sure couldn't. Though considering the lack of fuss Danielle assumed that Morgan had a plan B on that. "I can give that to you... But I want you to take Abby with you. Abigail. Abigail Foy. She's... She's over by the door."
"She's safer where she is." Thank god Morgan didn't seem in a hurry to call her out over anything. Who knew what else she'd found on Abby's transcribe.
"Morgan. I'm insisting on this. I'm not leaving her there helpless for whatever of these things comes around and you-- you seem to be able to deal with them. So I want her with you until she's somewhere safe."
"But you're fine with--" Morgan interrupted herself before Danielle could, shaking her head, "I can kill the Tython but that doesn't mean it's safe for her to be with me."
"Safer than here."
"I disagree."
"I'm not giving you the code unless you bring her with you." Danielle knew that technically if Morgan had enough voice samples she wouldn't need Danielle, but... Okay actually based on the unhurried look Morgan was giving her that was exactly what Morgan had been doing. "Morgan... Please." Danielle's voice broke a little, but at this point she didn't really care. She couldn't deal with Abby being left here for who knew how long until who knew what came around and killed her. "I need to know she's safe."
Morgan tilted her head up towards the ceiling and stared at it for a few moments, before looking back at Danielle with a sigh. "I've got one way I can think of to wake her up, and you aren't going to like it." Morgan warned her.
"If it's that or leaving her on the ground..."
"It is."
"Then get her up."
"It might be safer--"
"Get her up!" Danielle snapped, resisting the urge to slam her fist against the window. They'd already had this argument.
Morgan raised an eyebrow at her, then sighed, turning towards Abby and raising a hand to the front of her own head. Danielle was about to snap at her again when Morgan's hand started fucking glowing. Glowing. A sickening purple glow that radiated around her hand and her head and-- was her O2 going? Her suit stats said that she was still in safe levels but for all she knew she had a microtear somewhere and-- Abby was stumbling to her feet, unsteady and blank faced with the same sickening glow swimming over her face. What the fuck was she doing! Before Danielle could start screaming, Morgan was putting her hand down and Abby was blinking at her, clearly confused.
"Ms. Yu?" Abby turned towards the window, her whole face lighting up. "Danielle? Oh thank god you're alright. I couldn't-- I couldn't do anything." Abby rubbed at her face, swaying a little in a way that made Danielle ache, before suddenly swinging around to look frantically at the rest of the room, "Are they? Is Emma okay? Where's the Beholder! Ms. Yu we've got to get out of here!".
"Everything I came across is dead, but please be quiet. We need to listen for Mimics sneaking in." Morgan said, trying for comforting while sending Danielle a look that Danielle had no idea how to even start to translate. Then she suddenly jerked her head back towards Abby and for half a second Danielle was concerned until Morgan added, "Except for the other people the telepaths had control over. They aren't dead, they're all knocked out and going to stay that way for awhile. Mimics seem to need people conscious to breed so.... Well, nothing is likely to go after them until we can circle back around and get them as long as they don't wake up. Which they won't."
Breed. What the fuck were they even doing down in-- okay. Now wasn't the time. She could yell and get pissed later, when Abby was safe.
And thank god Abby didn't seem to have noticed the breed comment (what the hell Morgan). She seemed to be torn between checking on Emma and not taking her eyes off Danielle.
"It's okay Abby," Danielle said, choosing to just file all the rest of it away. Boy was she going to have a long list of things to yell about once they were somewhere safe. "Morgan seems to have figured out how to neutralize these things and we've got a plan."
They didn't actually, not really. But Morgan had a plan and Danielle had a plan and now they just had to figure out a way to marry the two. With a minimum of arguing. That was going to go well.
They'd have to make it work.
Abigail let herself drop back onto her butt after she finished hauling Ike away from the door, as far out of sight as she could get him. Her arms were burning and it... It probably wasn't the best idea to have wasted so much energy doing that, but she couldn't just leave them randomly strewn about the hallway like Morgan had seemed ready to do. She shoved back up onto her knees, bracing herself as she shoved him into what she hoped was an accurately remembered recovery position.
Her original idea had been to get them into the pool chairs but Danielle had talked her out of that. Probably for the best. But she had to do something if they were just going to leave them there. And she really... she really didn't want to think about it. About what it had felt like to-- not thinking about it damnit. Distractions. She needed another one. She needed a Danielle Sho level of things to do so that she didn't have to... think about anything. So that she could keep thinking so loudly that she was certain she was herself.
"You should probably know the plan." Morgan said from across the pool, slightly louder than she and Danielle had been talking before.
"Follow you, don't die."
Morgan huffed a slight laugh. "Sure."
"Abby," Danielle interjected, voice as gentle as Abigail had ever heard it, "Morgan's looking for an arming key so that we can blow up the station, and the aliens, as soon as everyone is safely clear. It should be quick, she knows where it is so it'll be in and out and then you'll head back down to her office. It's secure so you should be safe there for the moment. She's got the override for the door, and there's a stash of supplies by my desk. Worst case scenario, she's got the password for the utility to get out of Deep Storage the same way I did. I'll... I'll try to meet you guys there. I'm going to try to get in touch with Elazar and then I'll head towards the airlock in the Hardware Labs. That's closest to where you'll be. I'm low on O2 so..."
"Yeah. I'll meet you there." Abigail ached to say something else... she wasn't sure what. They'd ended things on such a bad note but clearly. Well. Clearly this wasn't really the situation to be thinking about that. And she probably should have been paying more attention to the infodump than to the sound of Danielle's voice. "Be careful."
"Pretty sure that's my line." Danielle sighed in her ear. "I... I'll see you soon."
"Yeah. Love you." Abigail couldn't not say it. Not in this situation.
Danielle hovered outside the window, hands curling on the glass as she answered softly "I love you too." Then she was gliding out of view.
She was probably still in transcribe range but, well, as goodbyes went that one was pretty okay. More than okay. They probably still had to... to talk things over. But, clearly, some things were more important. Danielle could be a handful but she was Abigail's handful. That had to be enough to get past all sorts of trials.
Abigail reluctantly turned back towards Morgan, not really wanting to see whatever condemnation or skepticism was bound to be there.
It wasn't, instead the other woman was messing with a weird looking gun, like a super soaker on steroids. When Morgan saw her looking she just smiled. "Here, gonna give you the GLOO gun so you have something to shoot that you can't kill me with."
Abigail wasn't sure if that was a joke... Okay no, it wasn't a joke. It couldn't be. Did Morgan Yu tell jokes? It was a fair assessment, though. Abigail wasn't sure if she would trust herself with a real gun either. "A glue gun?" She asked skeptically, holding out her hands for it. It was heavier than she expected, as was the pack of extra canisters that Morgan passed to her. She vaguely remembered something about this... Something about an explosion of mess down in Hardware due to a new device they were making. And a request not to have anyone clean away a 'snowman' made out of said mess. It was their mascot or something.
"Sure," Morgan shrugged, "just shoot it at something that's jumping for you or a Tython that's well out of the way of me, it'll stop them for a few seconds. Try not to hit me or waste all the canisters."
Abigail adjusted the gun in her hands, trying to shift it around and figure out how to aim it and shoot it and what the best way to carry it would be. "Do you have a normal gun? Nor for me, but--" Abigail cut herself off. Stupid question. Of course Morgan would have a normal gun.
"Too much to carry."
What.
"I've got other ways to fight," Morgan continued. "The GLOO is mostly to use to build a ramp high enough that I can climb to where I want to go, but it'll slow things down enough for me to take them out if they come for you and you hit them with it."
Abigail nodded, completely confused. She wasn't even going to ask what other ways Morgan meant. Maybe they'd get lucky and she wouldn't have to find out.
She frowned at her friends, still unconscious in the corner in recovery positions. "You're sure we can't bring the rest of them?"
"Positive." Morgan smiled at her, a sort of half odd thing that was clearly forced but, well, it was a smile.
And the weird thing was it working. Sort of. Really just this whole turn of events worked. Abigail was practically vibrating in relief. They had a plan and weapons and Morgan clearly knew what she was doing. This all felt so much less horrifying than before. She wished Danielle was here because, well because she wished she were here but also because she desperately needed some way of letting out the explosion of 'We can do this' that was echoing through her veins and-- you know what, screw it. She stepped closer and pulled Morgan into a hug, glue gun awkwardly sandwiched between them. She only regretted it a little as the other woman went stiff as a board.
"Uh..."
"Sorry." Abigail stayed where she was for a moment, needing that human contact for just a moment longer, then stifled a giggle as Morgan awkwardly patted her on the back.
She stepped back and smiled madly at Morgan. "Okay, let's do this."
Morgan nodded, still looking a little uncomfortable. "Stay quiet, keep an ear and an eye out."
Abigail followed Morgan towards the hallway then stopped, suddenly remembering something. "What about Stompy?"
"The Phantom? I killed it."
"Oh." From the way the other woman's head swung slightly, Abigail could just imagine what she was thinking, so she continued, "Not that that's a bad thing! Just. Uh. It wasn't... He wasn't a person, right?"
She was hoping for a quick no, a quick this was definitely just an alien and that alien definitely didn't have feelings or anything, but Morgan was silent for far too long.
"Well..." Morgan hesitated. "He was dead before he was a Phantom, if that helps."
"Um."
"Yeah, didn't really think so. Now stay quiet, we need to listen for Mimics."
"What exactly are we listening for?" Abby asked clinging to something that would let her not think about the corpse that she'd been hiding from earlier. Undead. What the hell.
"Kind of..." Morgan waved her hand a bit, then smiled. "Actually I can just show you."
And then between one moment and the next Morgan was gone. Just... Gone. Like a dream. Abigail looked around wildly, trying to spot her, then jumped back in a rush as something hit her foot, kicking frantically at the thing and barely managing to swallow a scream.
A roll of paper towels hit the other wall and then spun a bit, staying strangely together and not really moving in a direction that made sense. Abigail wasn't exactly a math wiz but she was pretty sure the physics on that didn't work, it was almost like it was moving on it's own...
It rolled slightly towards her and stopped. Then started rolling again. Then stopped again and stayed there, occasionally shaking. Oh my god. Morgan had somehow shapeshifted into a roll of paper towels. Or Abby was going insane. She was probably going insane. Just her in a hallway having hallucinated a whole chat with their VP and now she was staring at a roll of paper towels as it occasionally twitched and made a soft chittering sound.
Which... She had seen that before.
Abigail's hands slammed over her mouth, glue gun clattering to the floor. "Please tell me you were a coffee mug earlier."
The paper towel roll shook again, then suddenly Morgan was standing there raising an eyebrow at her, "No. That was probably a Mimic. If you see anything like that, don't pick it up. Keep an eye out for doubled objects, they usually don't go far after they replicate something. They'll try to sneak up on you but mostly they prefer to catch you by surprise when you're already holding them."
"I'm just going to... Stay behind you and be very careful. With my glue gun." She gingerly picked said weapon up from the floor. Morgan hadn't said anything about her dropping it at least. Which was... kind.
Morgan smiled at her, the expression not reaching her eyes. "Good."
For some reason Abigail had thought things would be less terrifying, following Morgan. It was only a short walk from Crew Quarters to Deep Storage and Morgan had already cleared the place out.
That misconception had lasted about as long as the first body, and completely broken when they'd gotten back up to the Arboretum and found it filled with aliens again. And weird gold... stuff that she wasn't allowed to touch and she sure as hell wasn't going to ask why.
She'd mostly hung back. Sometimes she shot her glue gun. Sometimes she spun wildly in circles looking for something to frantically shoot at with her glue gun because things were moving too fast for her. Sometimes Morgan took a few moments to repair a turret and Abigail very thankfully hid behind that. Mostly she just tried not to sob while Morgan... dealt with things. Somehow she survived.
Turns out the stompy undead guys were very very fast when they wanted to be. And sometimes on fire. And sometimes teleported. Thank god she hadn't tried to outrun that first one.
She didn't ask who any of the bodies were. She didn't want to know. They were all friends or acquaintances or... They were people she knew and she should want to know but their faces were so disfigured that she couldn't tell at a glance and... It was easy to just not ask. Their heads... She didn't want to know what did that and why. She vaguely remembered Morgan mentioning something about breeding earlier and she suddenly felt so insanely lucky that she hadn't tried to steady that mug. She was going to have nightmares about that mug for the rest of her damn life.
At least they had a plan, and Morgan was terrifying all by herself, so the plan would probably go at least sort of okay.
The moment they stepped into Deep Storage, the plan went off the rails.
Mr. Yu didn't help. The doors locked behind them, and he started talking, presumably taking credit for it and telling them why... But Morgan wasn't paying any attention. Her head was up and her eyes were wide, staring at something Abby couldn't see.
Before Abigail could even ask, the other woman had grabbed her around the waist and was bodily flinging them both towards a half open maintenance hatch, pulling the metal cover down over them and hauling Abigail further down the dark tunnel. Abigail looked frantically around and barely stopped the scream as something dark launched at them, but Morgan just shot her hand out towards it and caught the Mimic with a wave of purple that set the whole shaft to clanging. What had happened to being silent? Wasn't that the whole--
There was a sound like a fucked up siren above them as something stomped into the room, shaking the entire shaft. The sirens quickly faded into a wheezing growling when it didn't see anything, still so loud that she felt like she could hear it reverberating through the metal. Or maybe that was the way it was shifting it's weight. Or maybe she was going crazy. Crazier. Then it started walking again and her whole world was vibrations.
She didn't want to know what sort of thing would send someone like Morgan running for cover.
Morgan released her, eyeing the opening of the tunnel carefully before pressing a finger to her lips. "It's a Nightmare," she whispered. "It'll hunt for a while, but it can't fit in here so eventually it'll give up and we'll have some time to get things done. Just stay quiet until it passes."
In their ears Mr. Yu was still talking about how it was safest for Morgan to be stuck down here, clueless as to what he'd locked his sister in with, but Morgan still wasn't listening. Instead her eyes were on the grate, her movements following the Nightmare's steps.
Abigail wanted to do something. Anything. Sitting here and shivering, hiding from something even Morgan (Morgan! The one who'd just torn through teleporting monsters like they were nothing!) could do nothing against but hide... That was pretty much worst case scenario. Just sit here and wait for it to kill them or not and hope for not.
Morgan glanced back towards her, then pulled the bag off her back. "If we're going to be here for awhile anyways you may as well learn how to use some of this stuff. Just be careful not to activate anything. If it's dying to a grenade or dying to a Nightmare, I'm taking my chances with the grenade."
Oh that was so not what Abigail had meant by wanting a distraction.
Danielle had never lamented the range of the transcribes more than she was right now, waiting to see if they would make it to the vaults, waiting to see if they would manage to jettison correctly, cursing Alex Yu out with every fiber of her being. That asshole. That fucking asshole. It wasn't enough that he had to put them all in danger with his experiments, he had to lock her girlfriend down in horrorshow central? He had to have access to cameras or something, couldn't he see what was down there?
She was ignoring the fact that he'd locked Morgan down there too. If nothing else, the fact that he was locking Morgan up meant they weren't working together. Maybe she had grown a conscience and come back to try to fix things? Though that wasn't necessarily a good thing. If Morgan had tried to shut things down and was the one who had released all this...
She wanted to cling as close to the area the vault would jettison from as she could, but if she got too close and they hit her... It had worked for her, so it would have to work for them. If they could get out, then she could get them to Elazar. They'd worked it out, the big wrench in the plan was all the kamikazi Tython swarming the area and, well, that was what they needed Morgan for since apparently Morgan was the apex Tython hunter. Maybe she'd been gone at some sort of Tython fighting camp. That sounded like the sort of stupid thing the Yus would do.
Finally one of the vaults launched, and Danielle boosted after it, catching onto it as soon as its breaks slowed it enough for her to catch up. "Helmets on?"
"Yeah!" Abby answered. Morgan was silent but-- "Morgan got hit before hers went up though!"
Shit. What the hell did that mean?
Danielle hit in the code to open the vault, swinging in intending to see what the damage was... but instead she immediately got an armful of Abby.
Not that she minded. Not that she ever minded, even when she'd been trying to pretend she would. Fuck but she was stupid. Abby clung to her, and Danielle clenched her teeth in an effort not to cry. She couldn't go crying in a space suit, she couldn't-- it was a really bad idea. Especially since Abby's breath was clearly catching and... Fuck it. Danielle just held her for a second, their helmets clanking together softly as they hung there in the data vault.
It took everything of her to push Abby away, glancing towards Morgan, 'Please tell me she's still alive."
"Yeah," Abby reassured her. "I couldn't fully check her vitals and she's out cold but... I mean she can turn into a coffee mug. A hard drive to the face should be survivable, right?"
"She can what into a what?"
"Danielle, she's basically a mage now. Levitation, magic blasts, electricity and fire magic, shapeshifting... It's crazy"
Danielle stared at her, wishing that she could just not believe her but remembering way too well the weird glowy revive or whatever that Morgan had done by the pool. "What the hell were they even up to in Psychotronics."
"I don't know but apparently 'demoted and sent back to earth' is code for 'becoming like five X-men at once'."
Danielle sighed, taking a moment to connect her systems to Morgan's suit and verify that the suit at least seemed to think Morgan was right and sunshiny... more than she should have been, really, even just from a day of this much exertion and fighting, nevermind getting knocked out cold from concussive damage, "Okay. Let's... Let's get into the Cargo Bay as fast as we can. Did she have any weapons or..." She trailed off, eyeing the gun slung over Abby's shoulder. "Please tell me you know how to use that thing."
"I am practically a glue sniper by this point." The reply was a little too chipper, a little too shakey, and Danielle didn't even want to think about what Abby had been having to fight down in Deep Storage... but if Abby could use it then Abby could use it.
Except... "Glue?" She frowned. "Like the caulking gun they were working on in Hardware?"
"Yeah! I think? I don't know, it shoots giant globs of glue."
That... wasn't exactly a weapon but... Well. Actually. Considering what they needed to clear out, maybe they wouldn't need Morgan after all. Just shoot globs of glue at the flying whatevers and let them explode against it, coat the nests so more couldn't come out... This could work.
"She's got a bunch of stuff," Abby said, pulling at Morgan's backpack. "Like, there's all sorts of grenades and a stun gun! One of the grenades can even lure Tython over to it if we need a distraction!"
This could definitely work.
It had taken awhile, especially with Igwe getting increasingly panicked about his limited air supply as they slowly and carefully cleared out the things flying around near the cargo bay, but they'd done it.
And really Igwe's panic was just entirely unnecessarily. He'd had an hour's worth of air when they got there, carefully towing Morgan along with them. If it had been ten minutes then Danielle would have understood him more, but they had plenty of time. Regardless, he was safe with Elazar now. They were almost out of this. Or back into it.
The air rushed into the cargo pod once they sealed it again, and suddenly gravity reasserted itself, sending all three women clunking down onto the bottom of the crate. Danielle held on to Abby, who was holding on to a still unconscious Morgan, and somehow none of them were any worse for wear.
As soon as Morgan's helmet came down Danielle double checked her suit readings. Still fine. And Morgan appeared to be breathing so... Well. Not much they could do right this second.
Abby carefully slid Morgan so that she was on her side, in the same position she'd left the unconscious people in the pool room at. It was... probably a first aid thing. Abby knew that kind of thing.
Danielle shifted to sit more comfortably, linking to Elazar's transcribe. "I don't suppose you've got good news and you're about to send us a stretcher?"
"No can do. You can make a run for it if you want, if you can get to the turrets you should be fine."
Danielle heaved a sigh. "We're going to wait until Morgan comes to. No way we can get past whatever's out there while carrying her."
Morgan might have been confident that the Tython wouldn't go after an unconscious person, but Danielle didn't share that certainty and she wasn't about to risk one of the only people who could maybe fix this mess on something like that. She wasn't about to let Morgan get off that easy either, just another victim of the mess she'd made.
"Understood. Keep me updated." Elazar clicked off the connection.
"Plus if the Nightmare shows up we want to be in a small place," Abigail added. Danielle had no idea what the hell she was talking about... but based on her wide eyed expression it was something serious. She'd ask about it. Later. Once they were in the relative safety of Elazar's little sanctuary.
Danielle leaned back against the side of the container, closing her eyes taking a moment to relax after hours and hours of zero G and floating monsters. She cracked an eye open as she heard Abby move, half wondering if she should...
And then Abby took that out of her hands by sliding into her lap and kissing her. Danielle pulled her close as Abby's hands tangled into her hair, just deciding to forget about how they'd left things off and the Tython and what was next and...
By the time they came up for air she'd regained a little bit of her head, holding Abby back from another round. "We are not sitting here making out over Morgan's unconscious body."
"I mean, we aren't over it. She's got her own half of the place." Abigail tucked her head under Danielle's chin, closing her eyes. "We've got like ten minutes of things not being horrifying before we're back in it."
Danielle hugged her close, pressing a kiss to her hair. "Yeah. Who knew a cargo pod would be such a sanctuary." She sighed, "I'm sorry Abby. I'm-- I was such an idiot."
Abby reached a hand up to press a finger to Danielle's mouth, face pressed against her neck. "Nope. I mean. I'm glad. Not that-- I'm glad you're apologizing. But right now, I'm just happy that you're alive. That we're both alive and... We're alive."