Omega Force: Rebellion (OF11), стр. 55

"Take the ones behind us, I'll hold this door! Go!"

Crusher turned and opened fire, his heavy plasma rifle barking as the brilliant blue bolts of superheated gas vaporized whatever they touched. The light armor the guards wore had an ablative coating to protect against energy weapons, but not the kind that the hulking warrior preferred to carry. The powerful bolts of energy slammed into guards, melting weapons, and cooking through body armor like paper. Some went down without so much as a whimper, others screamed as an appendage was flash burned from their body leaving nothing but a smoking, cauterized stump.

"Hey!" Jason shouted.

"I don't have time for your bleeding-heart bullshit!" Crusher shouted back. "I'm outnumbered ten to one! Worry about your own side!"

Jason turned back in time to see that the guards trying to close in on his position had organized and were now coming at him from both sides. He stood up and fired six shots to each side, all of them aimed at the feet of the advancing guards. The railgun rounds ripped up the duracrete floor and sent shards flying into the oncoming guards, killing the four in the lead.

"Oops," Jason muttered. The other guards advancing on the security checkpoint decided that trying to rush an armored adversary while he held the advantages of controlling a chokepoint and vastly superior firepower was a losing strategy. They retreated along the outer walls to stay out of Jason's line of sight, dragging their wounded and leaving the dead.

“So, what the hell is all that?" Crusher demanded from behind Jason, pointing at the bodies. "Were you trying to cuddle them into submission with high-velocity debris?"

"That was an accident," Jason said loftily.

"I have retrieved the component we require and am moving back to your position," Lucky said over the team link. "I have also planted the demo charge on the outer wall where I suspect it is weakest."

"On our way to you," Jason said. "Phoenix, you copy?"

"We're here, Omega One."

"Bring her in, we'll be outside momentarily. Be ready to lay down suppressing fire…we haven't seen any heavy stuff yet, but that doesn't mean they don't have it. Watch your ass coming in with my ship."

"Copy."

Jason and Crusher ran down the wide hall until they encountered an Eshquarian guard coming the other way…carrying what looked like the avionics box they were after. Just as they raised their weapons to challenge the guard, it wavered and flickered before disappearing, revealing a battlesynth in its place.

"What the—" Jason just stared as Crusher moved forward and poked Lucky a few times.

"The ability to accurately mimic similarly sized beings is part of my new—" and explosion up near the security checkpoint Jason had just abandoned cut Lucky off. "Perhaps we can speak of this later. Take cover while I trigger the breaching charge."

They all leaned in against one of the bare spots on the wall until there was a tremendous jolt that seemed to shake the whole building. Dust and smoke came billowing down the hall, obscuring their vision again. Jason led the way, weapon raised, until he came to a jagged hole in the outer wall that was big enough for them all to fit through side by side.

"Phoenix is inbound," he said. "Head for the same hole in the wall and wait for pickup. I'll parallel the building before moving for exfil to make sure there aren't any nasty surprises waiting." He turned to look for Crusher, but didn't see him. Assuming he was covering their escape by staying inside the edge of the hole, he turned and ran across the hard-packed sand that would take him out in front of any obvious weapon emplacements they might have activated since the attack started.

"We're ninety seconds out."

"We'll be there," Jason said. "Drop the transit beam and standby."

By the time he was satisfied that the security response was still focused internally, Jason turned and ran for the pickup location just as the Phoenix burst through the low-hanging clouds. He made it there just as Lucky went up the transit beam with the datalink box in left hand and a plasma carbine in his right. Jason stopped and scanned the area, waiting to see if he needed to go back into the building to retrieve Crusher.

"Let's go! We're waiting on you!" he called over the team link when Crusher emerged from the building and ran across the distance in a surprisingly quick time for someone who didn't bother with much cardio training.

"What the hell? You taking a nap in there?" Jason asked.

"Yeah…sorry," Crusher said and stepped into the beam. He'd had an odd look on his face Jason had never seen before.

"We need to go now, Captain," Kage said. "The call has gone out, and planetary security forces are converging."

"Got it," Jason said, stepping into the transit beam and letting it pull him up into the ship, putting Crusher's odd behavior from his mind.