Moloch’s helmet pinged, alerting him of movement to his left. He turned and fired twice, hitting a hybrid in the chest as it moved forward in a low scuttling rush. It hissed with pain but kept coming, desperation increasing its speed.

Moloch’s blade flickered out, his voidblade biting deeply through the creature’s hide and into muscle and bone. The beast did not falter and allowed the momentum and bulk of its body to carry it forward slamming into Moloch preferring to sacrifice itself so that the others might finish the Centurion off once he had fallen to the ground. Salazaar charged forward and shoulder checked the hybrid hard, shoving it off Moloch and pulling him away from its snapping jaws.

The chamber was filled with dozens of different ripping sounds that were followed by wet splashes as the other hybrids had begun ripping through the gestation globules freeing the trapped occupants, that hissed and snarled their displeasure at the unfortunate circumstances of their birth.

Kotuk and three other beasts emerged from the darkness, their claws wet and dripping with the amniotic fluid. From behind them dozens of twisted lizard forms scrambled out, their flickering tongues tasting the scent of hot blood in the air. Their premature release from the globules had done the newborn hybrids no favors, being denied the last minutes to fully mature in Silhouette’s expedited gestation process had left their limbs withered and twisted. It was like the finishing touches to their bodies had been withheld. One hybrid scuttled towards them, driven forward with a mad hunger, its lower jaw was shrunken and malformed, and its front two legs were curled back, making it impossible for the creature to run, with any meaningful speed. Moloch drew a bead on it, and put it down with a shot right in the chest. Two of the deformed wretches turned on the wounded hybrid and began to rip it apart.

The rest moved as one, in an awkward scrabbling rush, they surged towards Moloch and Salazaar. They moved forward to meet them, slashing and shooting in a whirl of voidblades and emitter fire.

One lizard hybrid with no eyelids lunged at Moloch, and he kicked it hard in the chest. It screeched as both of its eyeballs popped right out of its head. It put its clawed hands to its eyes, and screeched in agony as the crude claws tore at its empty sockets.

A nagging feeling traveled up Moloch’s spine, making the hair on his neck bristle. He had not seen Kotuk or any of the other fully matured hybrids since the mob of deformed creatures began their mad rush, attempting to overwhelm the pair. “Maybe they were using the welps to -”

“Centurion, behind you!” Salazaar shouted.

Moloch’s helmet chimed as the proximity alarm went off. The warning came far too late. Moloch turned to see that Kotuk had launched himself into the air with a mighty leap and was now crashing down with all his weight to land on him. His armor creaked and groaned as the blow crushed him into the wet ground, as his head slammed into a rock lodged on the floor. “Now I die. ” Was the last thought that waved through his brain as he lost consciousness.

The pinging of the proximity alarm brought him back to a world of pain, as Kotuk’s claws began ripping through his breastplate as he dug at him with a desperate fury. He could feel the lizard hybrid's saliva dripping on his neck as both its jaws were clamped on his helmet, trying to crush it like an egg.

Moloch turned to look as his vision began to slowly clear. He shouted his emergency command to voice activate a shot of an adrenal booster that was stored in his shoulder armor. He felt the prick of the needle penetrate into his chest, and then it was like a light in his mind had turned on. He felt renewed with strength and all the pain from his battered body, seemed to fade away into the background of his body. He desperately struggled, but found himself pinned under the immense bulk of Kotuk.

“Die, monster!” He heard Salazaar howl, as he fired two emitter shots that struck Kotuk’s arm and abdomen. His pistol’s chamber clicked up to recycle, and rather than wait for the heat to spin off, the constable flung himself at Kotuk, voidblade raised high, to be brought down for a lethal strike. The beastly reptile lifted its jaws from Moloch’s helmet and Kotuk roared with pain, as Salazaars shots desingirated his flesh, but they had not struck anything vital and their damage seemed only to irritate it. The great hybrid’s arm shot out under Salazaar’s guard and caught him in the chest, with a vicious blow that sent him flying through the air where he impacted against a nearby wall. He slumped over, as two of the deformed lizards swarmed over him, one latching into his foot and tearing through the leather of the boot and into his flesh. The other grabbed his hand and began to crunch the flesh and bone in its jaws.

Moloch continued his struggle against the bulk of Kotuk, trying to do anything to help Salazaar but he found it was like an infant trying to squirm out from the grip of an adult.

“Oh what a magnificent savage you are!” Silhouette called down to Kotuk. “Take your fill from their flesh, and when you are done, return to me. We must leave this place with all haste.”

Kotuk ignored Silhouette’s praise, and had already returned to trying to crush Moloch’s helmet in his jaws, to get at the flesh inside, and he seemed as if he was in no rush to do so.

Moloch could still see the unconscious Salazaar being ravaged by the lizards. He wished he hadn't allowed the constable to come with him, he wished he hadn't been so hasty in following Silhouette. He hoped that Krasus and the other legionnaires were faring better than he was. The two hybrids had already chewed off Salazaar’s foot and hand respectively, crunching down the appendages and swallowing them. He moaned and moved his head.

A shape materialized out of the shadows. A white haired male in a gray beggar's robe appeared. Moloch couldn’t believe his eyes. “Forrester?” he thought, as the warning chimes went off in his helmet as the metal and composites creaked under the force of Kotuk’s jaws.

Forrester struck the bottom of his staff on the hard stone floor. On impact his staff transformed at once into the head of a living snake, with bright crimson glowing eyes, and a spinning crown of golden fire wreathed its head.

Not even the obscura bracer could conceal the surprise in Silhouette's voice.

“Who in the void are you?” Silhouette screeched from its dias behind the control panel, where it had been occupied in gathering its equipment into various packs, for a hasty departure.

“The time for introductions has long since passed.” Forrester said, with a wide smile.

“Why is the beggar’s guild here? If you leave at once, I will spare you.” Silhouette said, dismissively, recovering from its surprise and allowing the usual haughty tone to slip once again into its voice.

“But I’ve taken issue with you. It’s time to end this disgusting little science project of yours. You’ve made some very powerful people very angry. Particularly when you steal from them.”

Silhouette sneered as it started to back away from the control console. “You can’t steal something that never belonged to them in the first place. But those powerful people knew that already.”

Forrester held out his staff, and the snake on the head of it lashed out, striking both hybrids that were chewing on the hapless Salazaar as fast as lightning. Instantly, they began to bubble and curl up as if the power of his staff were desiccating the hybrids from the inside out.

With a roar, Kotuk leapt from Moloch and lunged at Forrester, swiping with both of his long hooked claws, aiming for his throat and abdomen. Forrester dodged one strike, and blocked another one with his staff.

Then he danced backwards with impossible speed and threw his staff at Kotuk. Kotuk reacted by throwing up his arms to block the strike. Rather than blocking the incoming staff, and sending it clattering off into the chamber, the rest of the staff transformed into a long thick serpent that wound itself around Kotuk, pinning his arms to his side. Kotuk roared with anger and rage and struggled with all his strength against the implacable might of Forrester’s manifested weapon. Moloch rolled over and pushed himself up, getting shaikly to his feet.

The snake reared up behind Kotuk and then struck the top of his head, burying it’s fangs deeply into its scaly hide, and puncturing the Reptile’s brain.

Kotuk swayed back and forth for a moment and then with a quiver, fell hard to the ground. The manifested weapon had already unwound itself and was slithering off in the darkness hunting the remaining lizards.

Moloch went to Salazaar, who was starting to come around, he was bleeding from the ragged stumps that used to be his hands and feet.

“How am I still alive Centurion?” Salazaar said, smiling wanly at Moloch with pale lips.

“You’re too tough to die.” Moloch said, pulling a small cannister of colag paste from his belt and spraying down Salazaar’s wounds. The foam made ugly clots on his stumps but it immediately stopped the bleeding.

“Whatever you say Centurion.” Salazaar whispered as he closed his eyes.

Moloch pulled his injectrix and dialed a dose of hemadex which was a shot of hypervital type neutral blood cells. It was an emergency medicine that had saved many legionnaires' lives from blood loss in the line of duty.

Forrester and his manifested serpent staff had finished slaughtering all of the hybrids left in the chamber. Silhouette had run to a far wall. Moloch instinctively ducked as a clag charge went off and filled the vault with a fine brown rock dust.

When it cleared, Forrester was standing over Moloch.

“You saved us Forrester.” Moloch said. “I owe you big time.”

“You would have done the same.” The beggar said with a broad white smile.

“I never knew you were an awakened. But it makes sense now that I think about it.”

“I would appreciate it if you kept that knowledge to yourself by way of showing your gratitude for my timely intervention.”

Forrester extended a hand toward the hole that had been blown in the wall by the clag charge.

‘Your quarry is escaping Centurion. I’ll watch over the constable and ensure no ill befalls him in your absence.” Forrester said, as the snake that was his staff slithered over to his feet and then with a shimmer it became an ordinary beggars staff once more. An awaken’s manifested weapon was shaped by the personality of the awakened and could be anything, but the one thing they all had in common was they were deadly.

“Thank you.” Moloch said simply, gathering up his emitter and voidblade and moving at a stilted run towards the hole in the wall.