[font=Lucida Sans Unicode]Rage took stock of his situation -- it wasn't good.
In his mind's eye he replayed the final moments of the assault. He watched as the compartment door was violently blown from it's hinges -- taking off the head of the nearest marine in the process -- and a flood of Hessians had poured into the room. Grim-faced and determined they immediately went toe-to-toe with the obstinate remnants of the raider company. In such close quarters the fighting got bloody and brutal immediately. EMP batons, combat knives and sometimes even fists and elbows became the main weapons in those final moments. But the end result was always a foregone conclusion. The disparity of good guys to bad guys was just too great. Eventually the last marine was down. And it was no great surprise to Rage that that last man was the chief himself, laying out a massive swathe of enemy fighters about him before their sheer numbers bore him to the ground, there to be savagely pummeled, kicked and stabbed to death.
In that moment, Rage remembered shooting a charging Hessian in the face with his blaster then reaching over to set off the detonator with the other hand... when a stun grenade went off close by his left ear. The shockwave slammed him back against one of the generators, knocking his legs from under him. Dazed, blinded, confused by the impact he had no opportunity to react before a mass of bodies descended on him. He was quickly stripped of his weapons and battle vest, his hands twisted up behind him and bound.
Three decks below the scene of the battle, his captors had released his hands and thrown him into a holding cell replete with square titanium bars across the entrance. There he found himself in the presence of two others: a young fleet lieutenant that he didn't know and another, badly beaten man that appeared to be just barely alive. His gently rising chest was the sole assurance of that fact. Rage sprang to his side. It was Kreggan, unconscious but alive! Well that at least was some good news...
"Hey buddy, can you hear me?" No response. He felt his pulse, found it faint but regular. His badly bruised and swollen face stood as stark evidence of two things: his navigator had not given up the ship easily and these Hessians were truly inhumane in their treatment of prisoners. There was no doctor here, nor signs of him having been treated by one. They had unceremoniously dumped him, half beaten to death, into this cell to live or die. They obviously couldn't care less which... well, that was just another on Rage's long laundry list of greivances against his sworn enemy. And sooner or later that bill would come due! He bent over his friend to tend to him as best he could...