Even as Dogmeat lined up his shot and commanded the rest of his drone pack to do the same, Cutter eased the nose of the T-bird up for a better view of the fleeing target and thumbed the red button on the right side of the steering column. A stream of lead streamed toward the wounded man, the path of hte bullets illuminated by bright tracers.
The man threw himself to the ground in desperation, only to be shot repeatedly in the head and torso by a succession of rotodrones.
And while Dogmeat was relishing the sight through his primary sensors, movement in one of his secondary displays caught his eye, and he saw two unidentified rotodrones diving down from the sky, spitting destruction on "him" as they came.
Closing in on the scene in time to see the death of his sworn enemy, Ichiro felt a series of punches land on his armor. The force of the blows from his invisible assailant threw him to the ground, and a split second later as he felt wet warmth spread over his skin beneath the venlar, and struggled to pull breath into painfully tightening lungs, he realized been shot. Playing back the last few instants of near falal time, he realized he'd seen a muzzle flash a dozen yards to his right.
Meanwhile, Alicia's ghostly form was watching the Seer's healing mana pour into the fallen Amerind. The dweomer was very strong, and the man was clearly recovering from terrible wounds in the space of a few heartbeats. And now, though his eyes were closed, his lips were moving rapidly, and she saw his own mana gathering force.
As much as that sent warning bells off in her mind, however, something else was more disturbing. The little girl that was the seer was not so little any more. Though the artifact on her head was apparently binding her to her physical state, it apparently did not limit the form that state could take. She was growing, and changing, and while the transformation was only now starting, it was clear it was not going to be pleasant.
