Face sent another spray of blaster bolts down the long corridor, the red beams telling him in brief flashes where the enemy stormtroopers were. The answer did not make him feel any better about their situation: too close and too many. He risked a glance behind him. Tarrik was pressing Fenn's hovering gurney hard against the wall, working fast to close them up, while beside him Garan bashed his blaster against the blast door control panel, knocking it off, exposing the wiring inside. As Face turned his attention back to the battle in front of him, he caught a glimpse of movement in the room beside him and he started to duck, expecting a hail of blaster fire to blow the door away - but nothing came. Instead he saw a group of surgeons huddled around someone on an operating table as several nurses held up portable lights, working desperately on their patient, who was very much awake and flailing their arms wildly as others tried to pin them down. Whoever had turned the power off had done so to the entire medical wing, meaning everyone in surgery had been put at risk, not just Fenn.
A too close shot drew his attention back to the battle, and he shot wildly down the way before hurrying to a new defensive position beside Ka'iulani.
'Next time you want to start a fight,' Ka'iulani yelled over the high pitched whine of blaster fire, 'remember to bring the sniper!' she let off a few shots and was rewarded with a cry of pain. 'Ha! Got the bastard!'
Behind them, the blast door slowly opened and Garan dived through the opening. A moment later he called back to them: 'clear!'
'You go, I'll cover you!' Face yelled at the other two.
'If you insist,' Ka'iulani didn't hesitate but ran for the opening portal, then aimed back through the opening as Tarrik pushed the repulsorlift gurney through, then joined them.
Face started to follow, then saw a door to his side. 'I'll be right with you!' he yelled, then dived into the empty operating room.
In a past life, he had been on a holoshow about a group of young surgeons in a new hospital, navigating the complex world of hospital drama and trying to balance that life with their love lives. He had played a trauma surgeon, scarred not just in body but in mind. On one episode that had earned him multiple awards, his character had to save a life while also dealing with a flare up of his PTSD, triggered by someone accidentally setting off an explosive in an operating room, the ensuing fire made all the worse because the room was connected to the main oxygen supply pipe. In the show, there were hookups in the ceiling where the medical staff would tap into the supply. Here, the hookups were the same, but the shut off valve was different, and it took a few seconds more than he was comfortable with to find it, but at last he did, opening the valve and letting pure oxygen flood the room with a loud hiss. As he stepped out he saw captain Skirata, just a few feet away and with a blaster pointed at him.
'It's over,' he said. Despite the Nexu's covering fire, he made no attempt to hide.
'I'm not so sure about that,' Face smiled, pulling out a thermal detonator and arming it.
Skirata narrowed his eyes. 'You wouldn't.'
'Oh no, of course not. I wouldn't be so stupid as to - oh,' Face threw the grenade into the operating room behind him. 'Whoops.'
'Get down!' Skirata yelled, throwing his arms out to drag the nearest stormtroopers down with him. Face plunged towards the blast door and was a good three metres away when the grenade went off.
The blast sent shockwaves up and down the corridor, rocking the floor beneath their feet, knocking them over. Heat seared their backs even through the armour and dust and debris clouded their vision. Face ran his hands over his body, checking for injuries as he regained his feet. Nothing hurt - well, nothing out of the ordinary, anyway. A quick look over the others told him that none of them had been seriously hurt, either. He looked back at the blast door and saw that there was no longer a blast door, just a piled of burning rubble. 'Kai is going to be so mad that he missed that. No one tell him.'
