[4-12] The Mines

[Amaterasu]

Fiara's mind was not unlike a raging storm of emotions. The strongest of them were fear and despair because of how she felt - half-dead, expecting the creature around them to recover from the throwback it had suffered at Marcus's hands, and for the little time that the metal-man had bought her to tick away unused. Marcus had defeated ONE of these things, but Izanagi knows how many more it could summon.
There was also sadness - deep, terrible sadness at Marcus's gruesome death, his body laying there right besides her, face down and motionless. And anger. She wanted to bring up the powers of her lineage, the purging flames of... well, Purgatory, and to burn this abomination to the ground until not even ashes remained. Except of course that she couldn't. Her parent, Moegami, could but he wasn't here. Amaterasu could, but she wasn't here either. Yes, she knew, in the back of her head, that Marcus was not truly dead if what Okor had said was true. But that didn't come to her mind right now.
The relief of Marcus having saved her from certain death was also there, somewhere. In the back of her head. Mostly obscured by despair and fear. Kind of like a candlelight in some catacombs.
The cocktail of emotions made her look indifferent, stoic almost, to any outsider that may have watched the Phoenix Girl laying there. The raging flames around her wrist were the only hint at what was going on within her.

Why had she not been hit yet, she began to wonder. Shouldn't the abomination have struck the final blow by now? Had it decided to let her bleed out? That would be an error, because she could feel her head slowly recovering, feeling a bit better... if it left her too long maybe she could retaliate. But no, she couldn't imagine that being the truth. On another note, why had the flesh stopped moving beneath her feet, and on the walls? Why was there no more sounds of flesh rubbing against flesh, of wet footsteps causing goosebump-inducing - and honestly, somewhat lewd, if you interpreted them that way - sounds when the independant flesh-golems moved around on the surface of its host?

Splat. Shloooorp... splat. Shloooorp... splat. The new sound made her groan and slowly get on her knees, looking up. Those were the sounds of a pair of heavy boots making minced meat where they stepped, and though they weren't coming from within her field of view she knew whose feet they belonged to before she heard the voice.

”Fiara! Marcus! Report!”

"We're here! We're... ouch!" She could not finish that sentence - or really, go beyond starting it - due to a sharp pain striking her skull. But the Plague Marine's footsteps were coming closer so she could afford to lower her voice so as not to put so much strain on her jaw and still make herself heard. "I'm... okay. Marcus... I don't think he made it. Okor, he... these creatures... he saved me and was impaled, but then they stopped moving. I don't..."

Okor reached down, grabbed Marcus’s body by the shoulder to turn him onto his back and examined him for only a few moments before nodding. "He's gone. And you are not 'okay'."

"I'm fine, I told you!" She raised her voice and immediately regretted it as another sharp pain nearly made her fall sideways. Luckily she reacted fast enough and caught herself with her hands. Okor didn't reply, he just stood there and stared her down from the expressionless eyeholes of his rusty helmet. Had he not worn it, the gaze could probably not have been any more intense. Fiara crumbled before it like an old cookie. "Fine, I'm not... my head's throbbing and hurting like hell. I've taken a blow from one of these things, and... fell down." She hated to admit it. She was feeling like more of a burden than an aid to the towering warrior who... was he even hurt?  His armor was so scarred and rusted, his body such a mess ravaged by disease and age that she couldn't make out if there were any recent injuries. Or if there were, if they even affected Okor at all. Maybe he would still live even if you cut his head off. She wouldn't put it beyond him. "You killed this... thing, didn't you?"

Okor had taken two steps away from her and had bent down, grabbing the construct that had impaled Marcus. He was tearing pieces out of it, seemingly searching for something. "I did... it's gone now."

"Great..." She decided not to even ask why he was mutilating that body and deactivated her blasters to hide the flames, then remembered that they needed reloading. So she activated one, ejected the empty shells, replaced them with fresh ones and deactivated it again, then did the same on the other side. "Listen, I'm sorry! I didn't mean for Marcus to go like this!"

"He saved you", remarked Okor over his shoulder. He stopped tearing the body apart and picked something out. "You are mortal, as I told you... Marcus however  will be back before long."

"Yes, but not here! Not with us, just like Vision! He'd be of more help to you than I would!"

"Be quiet for a moment." He turned around and held up a red piece of something. Plastic, as it turned out, with a white cross in a circle painted on its surface. "And tell me, where did this thing come from?"

"Uh... over from that wall right there. Right next to that outcropping with the severed tentacle", replied Fiara. Okor's words had gotten her off-guard and she had no idea why he'd asked her that. The Plague Marine however stepped over to the indicated spot and began to tear the walls apart with his fists, utilizing the rips and tears that Fiara's and Marcus's efforts had created. Before long he produced a red box covered in innards. It was missing its lid, but the red plastic piece he had found matched the rest of its appearance. He brought it over and threw it Fiara's way.

"Use this to patch yourself up." He walked over to Marcus again and began searching him for something as Fiara examined the box's contents. Some of it had spilled out but it was... medical supplies. She had seen some in the Dunes, she had seen bandits use them as she had snuck up on or past them, so she knew how they worked. Well, for the most part. She still needed Okor to point out what each bottle contained, but the Plague Marine kept his hands from touching the actual items, let alone helping Fiara. A real doctor could probably have made better use of it all, but Fiara was able to patch her head up, disinfecting the injuries, washing the blood off and applying a salve of sorts that made her feel better almost immediately. She gave a relieved sigh as it took effect, then finished her self-treatment by wrapping her head from the forehead up into a tight protection of bandages and cotton for cushioning.

"Thank you..." she murmured as she finished. "You know, I don't think anyone I've ever met has given me as many mixed feelings as you. You're... different. I just wanted to get that off my chest."

There were two alive people in this place. You do the math to who she spoke to.

1.251 words according to MS Word.

Fiara has reloaded her Phoenix Blasters (12/12 on both sides)