"Roger that," Paladin nods and turns away, drawing his pistols from their holsters. He racks a round into the chamber of each, drops the magazines, and replaces them with full ones - eight shots, ready to go. He loosens his sword in its sheath and finally looks up at the rest of the group.

"Alright, laddies, rise and shine." He waits while the sleeping guardsmen are roused, weapons are fetched and armor donned. His fingers flex with anticipation when finally the squadron falls in.

"Listen up, and listen good." He cocks a thumb at the warehouse across the way. "The bad guys are on the move, so while they're off leading D'Mourir to the gunpowder, we're going to go in and clear out their base of operations. There's a fething lot of them in there, so you'd all better keep your heads on straight and your arses covered. Partner up; I don't want any man leaving his partner for any reason. You watch each other's backs and stay frosty. Now, intel says these guys are religious fanatics, the kind that'll burn the whole fething place down rather than give in to the evil secularist government. We've had too many losses in the last month, so nobody try to be a hero. That's my job." He pauses as a rough and uneasy chuckle runs through the group. "We're talking thirty or more hostiles in there, no sign of civilians or innocents. I want a cordon around the building to make sure nobody gets out, and snipers watching the exits. The rest of you, I'll make entry and engage. You come in after me, stand clear and pick off the people I miss."

He pauses, and looks them over again. "I'm not being cocky, and I'm not denigrating what you can do. You're the best, or you wouldn't be here." Well, the best of what's left in the Guard, at any rate, but that's not exactly politic to say right before a hazardous raid. "So I want you to know where I'm coming from when I say that most of you are only gonna be in my way when the crap hits the fan, which is 'zactly what it's gonna do when we get in there. Keep close to the doors, stick together, and let me deal with the heavy stuff. Any questions?" Nobody raises their hands - the men shift their feet uneasily, glancing back and forth at each other - their expressions run the gamut from bored to scared to tense and ready. Paladin nods. "Alright, take your positions boys. And good hunting."

The squadron scatters, circling the building, taking up sniping posts with rifles and crossbows, and a small core forming up behind Paladin as he steps out into the streets. The eyes of lookouts in the warehouse building have barely enough time to widen before Paladin's across the street, moving so fast that he's more of an afterimage, an impression upon the eyes, than anything clearly seen.

The great doors bow and shatter under the force of his kick, and Paladin lands lightly in the pool of light from the street, his pistols in his hands.

"Rhydin City Guard! Drop your weapons and get down on the ground!"

A throwing knife flickers out of the shadows like a silver lightning bolt, and Paladin spins lightly, blocking it with one pistol and firing with the other. More spin out of the warehouse darkness and he drops and rolls, coming up with both guns blazing - the guardsmen rushing through the shattered doors are met by a tide of blackness armed with flashing steel as the cultists boil out of the dark, waving their swords, still in eerie silence. Swords meet swords with almost musical clatter, guardsmen shout in pain, and Paladin's guns boom out their heavy drum until the hammers fall on emptiness and the slides rack back.

No time to reload; he drops the pistols and ducks his head, lithely avoiding a sword slash that would have removed it from his shoulders. He twists, snatching at the striking elbow - his fingers twitch, his uncanny strength snapping the bone as easily as a boy might snap a twig. There's no time for the pain to even reach the attacker's nerves, though, as Paladin's knee buries itself in the man's stomach, ribs shattering like glass under the brutal kick. He flies back and Paladin uses the breathing room to draw his sword before wading into the tide of cultists, hacking and slashing like a man threshing grain. Swordblows fall off his shoulders like rain, deflected by his coat, and he dances through the crowd like a butterfly, every cut a graceful, lethal work of art.

It's not all one-sided, though; through the crowd, he watches the guardsmen fighting desperately, back to back. He swears to himself as he struggles to reach them, pushed back again and again by the sheer tide of numbers - there were more than thirty men here, lots more. He shouts in frustrated rage as he watches Simon go down beneath a wave of blades. The stone floor of the warehouse is soaked with blood, and footing is treacherous, slippery - Paladin's boots almost go out from under him as he presses forward again, still struggling to reach the remaining guardsmen.

He flips one of the foot-long fighting dirks out of his sleeve and fights Florentine, both blades working intricate patterns in the dim light. Even this does little to stem the tide - there were just so fething many of them, and even his incredible speed and strength are feeling the press. He's been holding off for fear that the gunpowder was still being stored here, but watching the men under his command slowly get whittled away by the sheer press of the foe - well, sometimes you just have to make a decision.

Paladin ignites.

Flame wreathes him like an infernal cloak, burning the closest foes to ash and driving the rest back. He strikes quickly, using the flame to burn through a path through the crowd to the faltering Guardsmen, then turning to fight back to back with them, letting the fire die - the cultists rallied quickly and pressed on, but the flames had done their job well, burning too many of them down where they stood. The tide had changed, and now Paladin and the Guards slowly cut their way into the warehouse, step by step. They fought to the last man, and an eerie silence descended on the warehouse as the last one fell, head nearly severed from his torso by Paladin's vengeful sword.

"Feth," he said, looking around. Of the men he'd led into the warehouse, barely a third still stood - and most of the injured weren't likely to last the night, not without major assistance. He wipes his blades clean on a dead man's cloak with quick, reflexive measures and jerks his medical kit free of his backpack. "You men," he jabs his finger at two of the lightest injured. "Search the warehouse, bring me any survivors, and find that fething gunpowder." He drops to his knees next to one of the injured guardsmen and began working, bandages for the walking wounded, doses of healing draught for the more critically injured. Patching up the results of the fight almost took longer than the fight itself had, and there was still transport to be arranged to the hospital or the clerics for the more grievously injured.

He looks up at the two scouts' return. "Report," he says shortly.

The taller of the two shakes his head. "No survivors," he says quietly. "And no gunpowder. Just a fethload of torture equipment..." he nudges one of the corpses with his foot, a disgusted expression splaying across his face. "Looks like some real sadists here."

"Frak," Paladin says, closing his eyes. It didn't surprise him that things had gone sideways so quickly - they knew they were heading into a bad place from the start. "I hope D'Mourir's having better luck..."

Alain jerked to a halt in an alleyway facing a dilapidated boathouse. He recognized the warehouses around him. He knew this area. It either was, or was on the edge of, Blood territory. He frowned - they wouldn't be too happy if and when they found out about the mess here.

The wagon entered the large building through double wooden doors, left ajar. Alain watched the other ten cult members enter through a doorway, still puzzling at their purpose. Help with the powderkegs, maybe? It struck him as unlikely. He winced as he killed the ignition, expecting the men to look his way... but they didn't. He could hear another motor or two nearby, on the water - a gas-powered boat on the RhyDin River.

He thanked his luck as he climbed off the motorcycle, motioned to Raven for silence, and crept forward. Maybe this would be his lucky break after all. He reached the edge of the building, across the street from the boathouse...

...and one of the large double doors creaked, and something whistled out of the darkness. "Ah!" He threw himself against the wall and down as the knife clattered against the brick wall. The tip had torn cleanly through his right shoulder, and he kept a hand clamped down on it. The pain was intense, but he could not afford to stop now. They had to move fast.

People in the street had paused to watch the strange men in dark cloaks file into the building, but a woman screamed when a blade went by, and the crowd scattered. "Take the other door!" Alain looked at Raven and pointed to the other entrance, and then moved quickly out into the street behind a fruit cart. Two more knives whizzed by, and with a groan and a shove, leaning on his left shoulder, Alain overturned the cart, drew his pistol, and began exchanging fire with the cultists defending the double doors.

Alain had gone through twelve bullets killing three assailants at the double doors, and Raven was already at her... handywork, when he walked inside.

Nearly a year on the West End murders had almost utterly desensitized him to the most elaborate gore, so his impromptu comrade's indiscretions with her knives and her captive's skin merely earned her a dry, "Is that really necessary?"

He inspected the wagon, eyed the blood on the slumped-over driver's back, and then stared at the Prometheus. The wagon's two horses stamped nervously, but appeared unharmed.

The sloop bobbing slightly in the water was completely empty. He heard the boat motor from before slowly churning away and looked at Raven. "Where's the rest of it?" He threw up his hands, not at all expecting her to have the answer, and then walked away to pick his way tthrough the carnage.

All the slain were the Servants of the Dead, and to the best of the knowledge, they had slain each other. He went to the far wall, where one man sat in a chair, slumped over. He was thin, thinner than the others, and perhaps his death had been less recent than the others but his skin looked especially ashen.

Even in death the victim had an eerie, sinister smile in his dark eyes, reflected in lips that were sewn shut and had scabbed over Alain shuddered to think how many times. He smirked, though, at something particularly ironic - he had been, quite literally, stabbed in the back. It was upon this careful inspection that Alain glimpsed at his hand, and saw in it a piece of paper, crumpled and bloodied, but still mostly legible.

"What have we here..."

The boat's low, loud horn grabbed the detective's attention. His face paled as he looked from the crumpled note to the river, understanding dawning on him before he stepped outside and saw the trawler.

It was loaded with kegs, enough to destroy a very large building, and building up speed. Even in the darkness he could see several shapes moving about.

They were running out of time. And turning his back on the room would cost him.

With a crack of a whip, loud whinneying, and the clatter of the double doors, the wagon shot out from the building into the night. He had a sinking feeling he knew where they were going...

"Raven!"

The woman frowned up at him, annoyed to be separated from her hobby. Her arms were covered in the blood of her victim, and was that skin in her hands? A year ago, it would have been enough to make him sick... but a year in RhyDin can be an awfully long time.

He tossed his keys across the building to her, and she snatched them from the air. "Take my motorcycle, grab Paladin if you can, follow that wagon, and stop them."

"Fun," she replied with a cold smile, but he wasn't listening. He took off down the docks, removing his coat off in the middle of the hard sprint, and it whipped off into the wind. He leapt over a small stack of crates and skidded in slush on landing, bowling right into a dock worker.

"Sorry!" he breathed in response to his protests, and then stopped, looking at the man. "Blood territory - that way - send them here - bombing!" The crumpled, bloodied dinner invitation was shoved into the confused worker's hands, and the detective was off like a bullet again. The trawler had slowed down as it picked its way through smaller vessels, and none of them seemed to be looking at him. He had just begun to pass it when he came to the wooden stairs up to the bridge. Cold air froze his lungs, and a recent smoking habit wasn't helping, either. He struggled painfully not to cough, and his head spun with that, the adrenaline, and the nagging thought that he might soon die.

Or, if he could not put his life at risk, others would perish in his place.

He grabbed the railing and launched himself up the last stretch of stairs onto the bridge. A wagon bumped him in the hip as he ran across the bridge, someone shouted, and he staggered but remained upright.

Alain forced himself not to think of the drop. He grabbed the railing with both hands and vaulted over, out into open air.

((Note - an edit was done on the afternoon of 30 December.))

Cold air whistled in Alain's ears, and with a metallic thud, he landed on the deck. He rolled forward into a keg, collided headfirst with it, and saw stars while it burst open, spilling black powder that blew across the deck in the wind.

"Don't look at me - kill him!" he heard from the bridge, and for all the quiet of the Servants of the Dead, still their boots clattered on the deck. The boat turned out towards the sea, and for a moment he saw two silhouetted figures against the city lights. The moment was all he needed. He reached for his pistol, and at once, thought better of it. Powderkegs completely surrounded him.

At a crouch behind cover, he bounced on his heels, his breathing heavy, labored as his lungs worked with frozen air, and counted to three. On three, he lunged forward and raced across the deck. He heard a muffled gasp of surprise as he reached one of the dark shapes and grabbed him by the arms. The man pushed back, but Alain pushed harder. He swung a leg behind the other's and whipped him over the railing. He thudded once against the side of the ship and fell into the water with a splash.

The ship was turning. They were out near the lighthouse and angling back towards the city. He thought he could see a new cluster of lights there on the Dockside waterfront, and couldn't help but wonder if that was the target...

Feet scuffled on the deck, and Alain whirled to stop a dagger coming his way, grabbing his assailant by the arm. For his trouble, the cultist sunk an elbow into his stomach once, then a second time. Alain groaned but would not let go, until he heard the hiss of steel and another approach. He doubled over, swinging his weight and swinging his attacker loose, stomach-first right into the thrusting blade in the hands of one of his brethren.

Alain caught the dagger before it could fall and lunged. Two living bodies and one dying landed on the deck. Someone kicked at his side, fingers tightened on his face, and stopped as he heard his dagger sink through skin.

The ship was silent, save the steady churning of the engine. It was eerily quiet, and reminded him how thankful he was to be done with this cult. He picked himself up, checked himself for wounds, and jogged over to the bridge.

Parts littered the floor, including the wheel. He frowned through the windows and saw the target getting closer. Distant still, but he did not have much time. He patted his pockets, looking for his matches, and someone grabbed him by the back of the head. Before he could resist, he was slammed into the doorway and tossed roughly to the deck.

Through bleary eyes he could see the man approaching. Tall, with bright blonde hair and a desperate look in his eyes. "Have you no respect for ritual, detective?"

Alain got to his feet and swung at the man. The blow was deflected and he was punched in the face, twice. He stumbled back into the railing, shook his head, and scowled. "Who the hell are you...?"

"As a mortal, they called me Grigory," he laughed. "...But when I die and this ritual purifies my soul... they will call me the greatest of Listeners in the spirit world, I am sure." He laughed again. Alain reached for his gun, and Grigory lunged. He smacked his wrist against the railing with a crack, and the revolver sailed off over the water and sank in with a splash. He grabbed Alain by the arm and the throat and held him against the railing.

"The bomb won't go off..." Alain grinned. "You'll have to hold me here, and we'll just - "

"The fuse has already been lit," Grigory answered. "It should be making its way down from the bridge as we speak, detective..."

The man was right. Alain squinted and saw a fizzing light slowly descending somewhere off to his left. He grunted as he was knocked against the railing once more. His fingers twitched. His right hand, though pained, was still functional.

"Any last words, D'Mourir?" Grigory leaned forward, uncomfortably close to Alain's face.

Alain looked down at the deck, back up at Grigory... and smiled. "Yeah... Got a light?"

Comprehension never dawned on Grigory's face. Alain's right hand flashed from his pocket to the side of the man's face, striking a strike-anywhere match with a hiss and the sickening smell of burnt skin. Grigory yowled and staggered back into a powderkeg, and Alain dropped the lit match on the deck. Once he saw the flash of light as it found spilt gunpowder, he propped one foot on the railing and launched himself off, diving into the cold waters below.

Grigory could only watch wide-eyed as the light seared right past him. It was over. It was all over. His lips cracked into a laugh before an explosion tore through him, consuming the ship in a fireball.