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Alexei's breath stopped in his throat as he saw the wave of energy released from the assassin moving towards him. He barely had time to turn and run when it caught up with him. He'd stopped too short, and was just inside the radius, flinging him away and down into the ravine below.

The world swam for what felt like eons as he tried to wrest consciousness from the hands of the darkness that pulled at the edges of his vision. He was badly injured, his wounds from the Ultima spell only exacerbated by his fall into the ravine. He couldn't make sense of the stimulus he was receiving, but in some part of him, he knew he was going to die without help, and soon.
Alexandrov. Alexandrov! Stay awake, boy! Your time is not now! Keep your eyes open! ALEXANDROV!'

Caine simply nods when Miles takes off to look for Alexei, knowing he wouldn't be any help in his condition. After a few minutes he faintly hears her calling to him that she had found their teammate. He sits himself up and tries to blindly crawl down the ravine, figuring it would be safer to crawl rather than try and walk. He doesn't make it far though when he feels the ground crumble under his left hand, and he quickly flattens back against the cliff with a frustrated sigh.
He was worried about Lilith. He could still feel her presence in his mind, but it was faint, and she hadn't said anything at all.

"What a relief," she said as he opened his eyes. One of them was bloodshot, but she'd rather see a bloodshot eye than have him laying there not opening his eyes at all. He shut it anyway, which was probably the best thing to do with the limitations they had on them at the moment. Even better, he had his voice back. He was alive and talking, that was enough for now.

"Yes, the assassin is dead and gone..." She didn't understand at first what Alexandrov wanted exactly, but figured it out by his second sentence. "I understand, but...I don't think I should leave you here." Watching him try to sit up made her even more concerned.

She wasn't on the verge of tears anymore, but sympathy was all over her face. Unless he ordered her to move, she was reluctant to leave the spot. With Caine blinded up there and Alexandrov basically rooted down here, she didn't know what to do with herself. "...Alright. I'll be right back." She got up to the cliff and saw that Caine had moved. If she could get them both in the same location, she would feel better about leaving them alone.

"Caine?" She reached out to him now that it was so much easier for her to see and rested her hand on his arm. "I'm going to lead you down to Alexandrov. Is that okay with you?" Miles didn't want to make him do anything he didn't want to, even if it made them both safer and her more relaxed.

"Alright," she nodded back at him and held her hand on his upper arm. Leading him down the cliff, well away from the frail edge, she brought him down to Alexandrov. "Caine's going to be here with you while I go look for prisoners," she said to their wounded leader and helped Caine to the ground. Although she did feel a little bit better with them together, she wasn't as content as she wanted to be. But the mission did come first and the curing was supposed to come after...going up the mountain for the fourth and hopefully last time, Miles began her search for even one prisoner. With that blast, she doubted it.

The area where they fought the assassin didn't look anything like what it had only moments ago. Decades of damage had been done in less than a minute. Just looking at the blackened and crumbling stone, she was all set to turn around and give up all hope. But over the edge where the trap was first laid for the incoming soldiers, she heard a soft whimpering.

She got cautiously onto her knees and worked her way to the edge. Looking down, she saw a soldier sitting an gradually shrinking outcropping with a nasty wound on his ankle. His bone was jutting out painfully and stared up at her with an agonized expression. She held her hand down to him and he didn't hesitate to take it. Pulling him wasn't easy, especially since he could only support himself on one leg. While she helped him, she thought that he must have escaped the spell with just the broken ankle from landing so roughly. That whole idea was quickly shot when he made it up to the level ground and she saw his back.

She couldn't help but gasp at the charred flesh covered the expanse of his back. Carefully, she knelt down beside him but kept a firm grasp on his arm. "Our leader has questions for you. Come with me." Her tone was firm and he whined wordlessly, but she was gentle when she slipped his arm over her shoulders and helped him limp down the hill once more.

"I found one," she said tensely. He weighed more than she did, after all, and her arms weren't strong enough to support him and his armor as comfortably as she would have liked. Propping him up against the stones opposite Caine and Alexandrov, she stood guard over him so he wouldn't even think of running. Between his burnt back, wounded foot, and her presence, he should stay put.


((I hope this alright...I supposed that since the soldier was in the ravine when he was stopped, he would only be just arriving at the top when the assassin was dying. Please tell me if I botched anything horribly.))

Miles watched the wounded soldier while she heard Alexandrov casting Cure on himself. It was something she should have thought to do, but there wasn't a thing she could do about it now. It was more important to make sure the prisoner didn't try to get away, though she doubted he would get very far.

"Yes, sir," she said and nodded. From the start to the finish, the young man never fought her. Despite the occasional groan, he was entirely compliant. Whether this was exhaustion or a favor, she didn't know, but was touched by it either way.

He did have a knife on his person, but it looked like it had never been used before. Either he was a squeamish soldier or he had purchased a new weapon just for this day. She imagined it was the latter one and pocketed the knife for herself. Reaching into his coat pocket, she found a sheet of battered paper with rough edges.

"Found something," she informed the others and held it over her head so they could see it too. Opening it revealed only that it was in another language or a code, so she couldn't have done anything with it right there anyway. "Sorry, but it's in something I can't read..."She passed it back to Alexandrov so he could decide what to do with it...as leader, it was technically his anyway. But he did seem slightly preoccupied with the damaged weapon in his hands.

"Aside from that, we're done." Up until then, Miles had maintained her cool professionalism. But this man had been her first time dealing with a prisoner and she felt obliged to him for some reason. "...Do we leave him here?" She would feel terrible leaving a wounded man in the mountains alone, quite possibly to die.


((Hooray! Thanks, Marcus.))

"Caine is correct. He comes with us. Heal his wounds - convention of warfare state that prisoner must be treated human-ly," Alexei ordered, taking the sheet of paper and looking at it. Something about the writing stirred what felt like a memory, though he knew he'd never seen anything like it before. It reminded him of how the reliefs in Hades' temple had seemed so familiar. He stared at it for a moment, then folded the paper and tucked it into his jacket. He'd leave it to code breakers when they returned.

"Move out," he then commanded, shouldering his broken rifle and starting painfully down the path back to the Garden.

Caine follows his companions carefully, feeling his way blindly behind them. About halfway down the path, his vision begins clearing as the Blind spell wears off, and he sighs in relief as he begins to see again.

((yeah.. really don't know what else to put...))

She nodded at Alexandrov when he turned around, not wanting him to think that there was any trouble. He had suffered enough already. Both him and Caine, actually. She did get hurt a few times herself, but she had forgotten about it in her concern for them and probably wouldn't remember again until after it was all over. The most she would get was soreness after the fight while the others had serious injuries.

"Thank you, sir," she said softly and smiled at the sight of Balamb. She wasn't exactly at home there, but it was the safest place she knew. And after that fight, safe was all she wanted to be, if only for a little while.