Part 1

[walk_ins]

There's a bump and a lurch felt through the entire Academy as Serenity docks, unwelcome. Claxons blare. In the main dining hall the Students stir and murmur, confusion more than ever writ large on their face. The Advanced Students in their special cafeteria have less of a reaction; the outside world matters less and less for them.

In the staff dining hall, the doctors, teaches and nurse exchange looks and outbursts of confusion and consternation themselves. Theories fly around; a meteorite, maybe, or an unexpected docking. Or something gone wrong with whatever madness the Doctor is up to. Only Dr. Sergio Lin actually bothers to leave the room.

In the Special Wing, the Doctor and the Graduates wait for their door. Whatever it is, the guards will take care of it.

It only takes a few of the Blue Hands to guard the dining halls, under normal circumstances, and the rest are here in the Security Lounge. It's a narrow space, with a sterile stink to it; some indefinable imprint of their inhabitancy. Crowded tonight; there're guests in town. The room is decorated with watercolor paintings, all turned upside down. When Serenity arrives, their heads all swivel as one in the direction it came from, and as one they stand and move towards the doors, drawing pistols and slim blue wands from their jackets. They meet Dr. Lin as they come out, and he confuses the situation with semi-hysterical and self-contradictory orders.

And at the docking point, the doors burst open, and with no further ado quite a lot of heavily armed people burst into the skyplex.

Things have begun.

Comments

[walk_ins]

Even as the press from Faith's side slackens, things pick up for Mal. They shove and cram through the door, trampling the bodies of their own dead, fighting and clawing to get inside. In many cases their latex gloves rip open, revealing scaly talons.

A knot of them makes it through, and they open up a hail of bullets on Mal.

The first bullet bowls him over, but does no harm, deflected by Tom's bullet charm, and the remainder fly over him, into the crowd of students.

[walk_ins]

Nakomis takes a round to the head and pitches over, dead right there. Another slug rips open a shallow groove on Stefan's hip and he folds over, barely holding himself with his hands on the table.

[badinlatin]

Mal recovers quickly, not having the time to turn and see any damage behind him yet.

Before he stands up, Mal has just enough time to pull the bone-handled hunting knife from his highboot and hurl it at a guard, landing square through the shoulder.

[faithful-slayer.livejournal.com]

A pretty young girl, dead and bloody on the floor.

She could be a Slayer.

Something in Faith snaps at the sight, and she narrows her eyes, pressing on the guards with renewed fury.

Broken necks. Throats slashed open. Bare hands doing damage that no human could ever hope to without some kind of weapon.

And none of them have touched her yet.

[badinlatin]

Mal rushes the guard reeling from a blade to his shoulder, and takes his pistol butt, smashing it into his throat. The guard behind this newly-dead receives a stab wound to the arm as he tries to swing at Mal's head, and a bullet to the brainpan.

Another guard comes into view and manages to slam into Mal's back before he had a chance to spin and shoot the guard once in the back of the throat.

Mal turns to resume his post.

[walk_ins]

In the burning kitchen, fire alarm sirens blare, and then emergency overrides lock in. Fire is a very serious thing on a space station, and kitchens are the most dangerous areas. The doors, both the one leading to the cafeteria and the one leading out, lockdown, and a solid steel sheet slams down over the hatch communicating between the two.

In a matter of moments the fire is choked out, and any of the Hands of Blue (and two nurses and a doctor whose night on the rota it was to prepare dinner, say sorry) who hadn't burned to death suffocate instead.

The last strength of the seige hits at the same time; a few Blue Hands get past Cuthbert--only for a moment--and one of the screamers lands on a table. Simon smashes it with the butt of his gun, then drops his gun to turn to a wounded student---

and then his own gun is drawn on him.

[walk_ins]

Beth's arm is steady and her eyes are cold and flat. "Revenge the blood." Her hands may be steady, but her voice isn't; it's high and tight with stress, and shaking just a little. "Blood on the leaves, green is red. It's red. Turn it off. Turn it off or she'll slay you. Slay him herself."

Cuthbert: "Someone get that gun the fuck away from her, now."

[faithful-slayer.livejournal.com]

Faith double-takes at the use of the word 'Slay', but only for a second - she can't afford to look away from what she's doing right now, and the only way she could get the gun away would involve hurting the girl, which she's not willing to do.

Not yet, anyway.

[walk_ins]

Ted tries to talk to the girl quietly, but it only prompts her to swing the gun around to point at him.

Sarai rises up behind her, slim and swift and tall.

There are fewer blue hands, now.

[badinlatin]

Mal takes aim and makes quick work of the remaining blue hands.

All except for one.

One blue hand he merely shot in the leg, and Mal chooses to walk within a yard's distance of the guard and shoot him in the forehead.

Mal's hand shakes slightly as he slides his knife into his boot, other hand still gripping his gun.

[walk_ins]

There's a quiet meaty thunk as two knuckles connect very precisely and quite hard with the superior cervical ganglion, the nerve center between the second and third cervical vertebrae.

Beth drops like a stone, gun tumbling from her suddenly nerveless hand, and Sarai catches her.

"Sorry, mèimei," she says softly. "Get your head down. The angels came. Gonna be okay."

The blue hands stop coming. The seige has lifted.

[faithful-slayer.livejournal.com]

As the last blueglove dies, Faith starts to become aware of the mental message - you're safe, get your head down - that's been playing in a loop for a while. She rubs her forehead, looking around the room, and only peripherally catches the 'angels' reference.

Demon Bastards - dead.

Students - mostly not.

Gunslingers, crew and Slayer - entirely not.

It could have been worse.

[badinlatin]

Mal can feel the palpable adrenaline in his body begin to ease off. Doesn't make his left hand stop shaking, but no one notices. Or would probably care at this point.

He's alive. His crew's alive.

I ain't dead yet, Wash.