Board Thread:Role Plays/@comment-25389303-20180831104140/@comment-25389303-20181226130841

A chorus of alarmed voices cried out as Nobel's toxic fumes flooded the woods. While their protective suits and masks meant the gases were relatively harmless, few wanted to risk advancing blindly towards their deranged quarry. However, at Farran's harsh words those closest regrouped, levelling their guns in the general direction of Nobel as soon as the Director had been safely escorted away from the fighting - largely thanks to Titania's rapid response to the oncoming attack. Setting their weapons to lethal, they began form a small gunline behind the young huntsman before pressing forward into the toxic mist.

Blanc, meanwhile, was not so lucky. Separated from her captors, she had been left to cough and choke as the poisonous gases engulfed her, causing her exposed skin to slowly crack and her breathing to become ragged and weak. In her mind, four words repeatedly screamed.

I don't wanna die...I don't wanna die...I don't wanna die!

With her hands still bound, Blanc barely managed to summon the strength to rise. The pain in her twisted leg had largely faded into a dull ache as a fresh, corrosive agony swept over her, and yet a strange concoction of adrenaline and pure dumb-minded determination forced one foot ahead of the other in a constant - if uneven - rhythm, as she pushed onwards towards Nobel's dark silhouette.

As she neared the figure the thick smog around her began to disperse into a light haze, heralded by the fading of the burning sensation scarring her face. But even as it cleared, Blanc's heart sank, for it wasn't Nobel she had been walking towards. The figure, she slowly realised, was too short and thin to be the doctor.

When the last of the smoke cleared, Blanc suddenly found herself face-to-face with Titania.

Diaboli's young apprentice wasn't sure what to do in that moment. Should she run? Fight? Surrender? A dozen situations played out in her mind in an instant, though none of them ended pleasantly. Her leg ached. Her skin burned. A myriad of unidentified injuries suddenly made themselves known to her with sharp lances of pain. And yet she stood there, straining to think how to best this new obstacle. Finally, she opened her mouth to speak.

And then she staggered.

Blanc didn't hear the first shot ring out, but she felt it. A hard thump in her lower back, just below the plating of her chestpiece. She felt the breath leave her body as she fell forward, barely keeping her feet as she watched a stream of red begin to flow from a hole in her jumpsuit, running down her waist and staining the fallen leaves at her feet. She stared at it for a moment, not even processing what had happened, before several more thumps sent her crashing forward.

I don't wanna die...

Blanc's mind repeated the words as she fell to her knees. Out of the corner of her eye she saw one of the soldiers Farran had rallied emerge from the smoke, shouting something inaudible to his comrades as he identified his mistaken target. But by then it was too late. The pain had left her - replaced by a cold numbness that was slowly creeping up her legs, consuming her. In the back of her mind a voice cried out in panic as the corners of her vision began to darken, but she no longer had the strength to resist it.

With a drowsy sigh, Blanc finally collapsed into the dirt. And this time, she didn't get back up.