"Answer me!" Zenon demanded, grabbing woman's arm in tight grip and pulling her closer until the silver screen of his helmet nearly touched her nose. There was authoritative tone in his voice, clearly he was not used to people disobeying him. "Do you want to have your people to suffer just because of your stiff tongue?" he asked, irritation apparent. And because of it, he didn't see her attack coming. With quiet oomph, he fell on one knee, his grip on her loosening and then it was just a flash of red hair fleeing. Adel always said his quick temper would be his downfall and it turned out to be so, literally.

The last standing soldier took aim, right between her shoulderblades, but Zen sharply pushed his gun skyward. "No," he said simply and stood up, dusting off. He always felt that he had a lot of power at his very fingertips, simply granted to him by birthright, but the most important one to him seemed the one that one possessed inside of themselves. Never before he had seen someone of Below show even a sign of it. Even if they rebelled, it was like animal's survival instinct flaring up, joined with animal's cunning. For that reason, he didn't think highly of the people here, they were just savages and dragged down to the point they couldn't be anything else. But not her, not this Imhoff. She was fire, she was will. She had earned another day. "Gather the men and put them on ship. The unconscious one, too. Let the women and children go. We have no use for them right now."

His order was followed to letter and he was returning to the ship as he heard team 2's voices, telling they had found Adelmar and had another captive to bring back to the ship. He told them to bring the man back to his ship, since anger tainted plan was already forming in his mind.

This is how they got to this point...

She hissed, more from desperation and anger filling her lungs than pain, as he twisted her hand. It didn't matter that he had kept in mind what she had told him before, right now nothing mattered aside from that tiniest chance of her freedom slipping through her fingers that were too weak to hold it. Seconds later, the cool blade was against her throat and she really, really wanted to squeeze her eyes shut, but she refused this urge. She would pass into darkness of death looking ahead, the last futile act of braveness.

Suddenly, he was turning her head and leaning in. A shiver run down her spine at the unexpected and somehow gentle contact. It contrasted with the knife, with everything, and suddenly tears sprang in her eyes. Or maybe it was from his words, because she knew he was right and it was wrong. Their lives, everyone's lives, they were all wrong. Mannik's slight touch was like a thirsty man taking his first and last sip of something and the sense of disgust that should be there, it just never came.

When he moved away and tossed her the mask, she put it quickly, surprised she managed to with her trembling fingers, but she caught that expression and Adel's jaw clenched. No, she wouldn't be guilt tripped into fighting for survival. If anything, that was one thing he should understand. Moments later, the doors swung open. It was just matter of seconds and then there'd be silver suited men sweeping in, blood everywhere as he'd open fire.

It was more instinctive reaction than a planned action, but suddenly she was running, half jumping on his back from behind. "Not this time!!" the woman growled, a well aimed kick landing in the back of Mannik's knee joint, then another for good measure. Even if he managed to remain standing, his aim was probably thrown off by the unexpected attack and the descenders, alerted by her voice didn't suffer as high damage as they could. Her mind told her best plan would be to yank him by hair, use him as shield so she'd not fall victim to friendly fire, but instead, she moved so her body shielded his chest area, clawing at his hand that held the gun with unexpectedly sharp nails. Later, she'd wonder why she fought to protect both sides in this fight, but right now she just couldn't do anything differently.

And then Mannik stilled. The first thought was "they got him", and she pulled away sharply, but although the man's eyes were growing glassy, he was still breathing and red wasn't pouring out from anywhere. Then Adel noticed the dart in her captor's leg - she recognized it as the one used on valuable workers that were trying to run away. It was filled with drugs and extremely quick working. They could put a grown man out of it in mere moments.

She felt strong arms pulling her away and the woman let them, as her knees started to give in. Honestly, rest passed as a blur until she was on the ship, Mannik a slumped pile on the floor in same silvery vessel. There were so many Descenders here, she couldn't tell them apart with their helmets on, but she saw that two were heavily injured. Probably the two Mannik had shot. Quickly, they shed their helmets and before Adelmar knew it, Zenon pulled her in his arm and gave her the most passionate kiss he ever had.

Woman didn't know if this separation had woken some true feeling in her fiancee's heart or it was just adrenaline rush pumping through her fiancee's veins, but she also didn't really care. Only things on her mind were that she hadn't brushed her teeth for few days and everyone was looking. For some reason, this fact bothered her more than usually and after a polite time into the kiss, she pulled back and hid her face in Zenon's shoulder. This was what she wanted. Feeling safe and precious for few moments, in arms of man who had risked his life for her. He had and he had also put his friends in danger. And he was holding her tight, holding back of her head and caressing her hair, as if assuring that everything will be alright. It felt like she could just pass out this moment of black-edged bliss.

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