"Or maybe," she mutters, as she turns off the damn radio, "you can't get all the details from a sparkly hit news piece, and the truth is a hell of a lot more complicated."

She thunks her head against the wall behind her. Maybe she'll knock some of the stupid out. (Ha, then what would be left?)

Well. She has a job to do, doesn't she. Maybe she can even manage to avoid killing anyone. That'd make Zash happy. And she... kind of feels like she owes it to him, to not, you know. Completely disregard his morals when trying to rescue him. She's absolutely going to get shot so much, though, so. Give her credit, Typhoon, she's burning up lifespan just for you.

But then, she was never going to have a normal life anyway, so.

A little while later, the guards currently in custody of the dreaded Zash the Stampede do not know what hit them. Mostly because what hit them is a big laser gun shaped like a cross. Bit inexplicable, that. As a bludgeon, not the laser bits, she's attempting to be good.

The laser bits are for cutting through the solid steel box holding him.

"Heeeeeeey buddy time to go rise and shine," she calls into the box. "How tied up are you because we have so got to go."

"Not," which is reasonably impressive given that the thing that's in the corner there is a straitjacket. The other things that are in the corner there are his red jacket, which he had very much not been wearing when he had several tonnes of metal dropped on his face, and his gun, which the Police had most certainly taken from him.

Also, there is a noticeable dent on another wall of the metal box and the knuckles on his right hand are bleeding.

"Let's go," he says, grabbing his jacket and his gun and rushing towards her. "What's the status? How are the people on the steamer? Did Nai steal the plant? Is Legato gone?"

She will not question him and his choices. The metal box had it coming.

“Most of the security force got slaughtered, but the passengers were mostly left alone. Legato is gone with the plant, Knives himself never showed up, but our least favorite prick is a loyal sonuvabitch so you can consider it delivered to Knives.”

Look, more security to keep hold of Zash! Isn’t that cute. She’ll let him handle these, he’s better at pacifism, her job is to lead him out of here. To which: they are going this way.

He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath when she mentions the guards being slaughtered. This obviously has no effect on his effectiveness at dealing with every guard here without breaking a sweat.

He tried so hard...

"Fuck," he says with feeling before opening his eyes again. "Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck!" He takes a break from punching guards to leave a dent on the wall of this hallway.

She winces a little, but. Yeah. … Yeah.

“There’s more but it should wait ‘til we’re not quite so,” and that’s when some Julai Police show up, shooting, which does result in at least Morgan getting shot. She’ll get over it, but ow. The Police can be introduced to the business end of her gun, which in this particular context means being literally hit with it. “Y’know.”

Zash can rush ahead of her, then, and block most bullets with his own bullets, his robot arm, or his body. He doesn't burn through lifespan when taking heat. Or if he does his lifespan is somewhere in the several hundreds maybe thousands. Not to be worried about.

He also doesn't want to think about what she's implying because he's not sure he can remain entirely pacifistic depending on what exactly it is.

There is a mild trail of destruction that they follow out; clearly Morgan’s route to get to him, but it’s obvious she was pulling her punches. There could have been a whole lot more death and injuries; the laser gun is mostly for cutting through walls. She does that one final time, and then they’re out of the compound.

To a whole lot of guns pointed at them. It seems that there was an ambush and they are now surrounded.

“I cut to sewers, you handle… that???” she offers, already getting ready to execute said plan.

"Zash the Stampede!" calls someone, recognisably the same Police Captain from back in Jeneora. "You are surrounded! Drop your weapons and surrender!"

He smiles sheepishly and raises his hands. "Oh, my, how did I get here..."

"Are you going to destroy this city too?!" asks a different officer, one who's holding his gun particularly hard and looking particularly intense.

—he freezes, at that, staring at the guard.

"I won't let you turn this city into the next Jeneora Rock!!" he says, his eyes, visible through his goggles in the low light, looking wilder by the second. "My parents were in Jeneora when it happened, and you... How could you?!"

Oh.

He lowers his arms.

    The man shoots, once, straight through Zash's heart.

"H-hey, I didn't give the order to shoot!" the Captain says, though he's looking terrified by what Zash might do after that.

...nothing, is what. He winces a bit, in pain, and lowers his eyes. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry..."

Morgan, meanwhile, has finished cutting them an exit. Fortunately for them, she did her homework. The metal is cut in three places and bent inwards, leading to cramped, dark, and smelly sewers below.

She looks at her creation morosely. “Really didn’t want to have to use that plan. Exit done, stop getting shot and hop in. We’ll bend it back so the squishy humans can’t follow.” And then without waiting for him any longer, into the sewers she goes.

He turns around and starts to follow Morgan, not looking over his shoulder again. The guards are all... too shell shocked to do anything, especially the one who shot, who's just staring at Zash like... well, like he just shot a man through the heart and watched him walk away with barely a limp.

Once he’s through, the exit is bent mostly back into place, and for good measure she gives the raw edge a quick welding laser blast to haphazardly seal it shut. They’re left almost entirely in darkness, but Morgan has her lighter and an idea of which way they should be going. Which is that way.

Zash's arm has an attached flashlight, that's probably better. He turns it on and follows Morgan, silently, barely looking at where he's going.

Yeah, it’s better. She puts her lighter away and can just be the sewer guide.

“… sorry,” she says, without preamble.

"It's not your fault," he says, before coughing some blood.

“Not about that. …Jesus, man, do you still have the bullet in you, why didn’t you say something, get it out, and.” She hesitates. “And get yourself fixed, because. We have a ways to go and we’re going to want to be fast.”

...well that rules out some theories for what the unsaid thing is and... leaves some very unsavoury alternatives.

Better ones, though.

"Give me a minute," he says, stopping somewhere he can sit and then taking his arm, jacket, and shirt off. Then he puts his arm back on and starts digging into his heart, which causes some more wincing and coughing but no complaining.

“Yeah.” She shifts her weight from one foot to the other, more anxious here than she’d been with all the guns up top.

“… I asked Zazi to keep her alive,” she blurts. “Because I didn’t know who would show up for the plant but I knew it was going to happen, and. Zazi knows Legato better than anyone, so Yvette probably was gone before he even got there.”