Mark said, "Fine by me.", and started walking. Det was still on his back as they traversed deeper into the jungle. Mark saw anoles in the trees, though they didn't look hungry and looked at the group with bored disinterest. As they got deeper, Mark heard a sound and pulled out his Plasma Rifle. Suddenly, a Florida Panther about 3 times bigger than normal attacked.

Henry trekked through the forest with an expeditionary force of 10 soldiers along with Nathan and himself. They reached a river and Henry debated whether power armor would weigh them down. "Only one way to find out," Henry sent one man over and found that he could walk along the bottom nicely. "Okay lets move on then," one by one they moved across the river and Henry found himself hungry. "Lets stop to eat, we;ll move out in 10 minutes," gobbling down some rations Henry looked at his surroundings. They were upriver and the forest stretched as far as the eye could see, which was not very far. However Henry noticed some movements far downstream and Henry took out his binoculars and investigated it. His suspicions were right, it was Demetri and his little group. They were struggling across the rive and Henry marveled at how easy power armor made it for him. One of them was carrying Starr, one of the only good ones and Tom, who was okay. However, the rest Henry recognized as Roy's mercs,damn! looks like Roy got to them first! "Nathan! you had better look at this."

The panther had jumped Duran knocking him to the ground, Duran used his hands to keep the creatures powerful jaws away from his throat. Demetri watched as Saturn jumped onto it's back and pulled a knife out, she struggled to get the knife through the predator's thick fur. "Dam," She muttred. Demetri rushed forward to give a hand, with those two stuggling with the creautre no one was able to shoot it with a large risk of hitting the others.

Demetri got closer and put his fist into the side of the beast's face, the cat brought it's claw around striking Demetri across the chest, knocking him onto his back. Duran had used the time to get out from under it and picked up his shotgun. Demetri picked himself up, he had blood sweeping from under his armour, seems the claws were long and sharp enough to get through it, and the armour now had four long gashes along it as well.

Starr rolled to the ground as the panther jumped at the group. As she came up she had her M4 ready to fire. She noticed Duran and Saturn were near the beast, she couldn't risk hitting them. Demetri ran to their aid, but was knocked to the ground. His move bought them enough time to clear away from the beast. Starr fired off a long burst at the panther, the bullets slammed into it's front leg. It let out a loud roar that was loud enough to that Starr had to cover her ears.

After firing off a few more busts she yelled, "We need a different tactic, its pretty resistant to our guns."

Mark ran over and gave it a swift chop with his machete, cutting off part of its its tail. Enraged, the big cat ran over and pinned Mark to the ground. Mark then stabbed its foot with his Combat Knife and the panther was forced to let go. As Mark turned around, the cat slashed his back, leaving a nasty gash. Mark then pulled out his Plasma Rifle and started shooting. The plasma gave the panther horrible burns, but it kept on coming. Mark yelled, "Starr, do you still have any explosives?!"

Demetri tackled the beast around it's neck knocking it to the ground, the beast gave out an annoyed growl and held on to it, keeping it near him. Demetri banged his fist into the side of it's head, not doing much, but it made Demetri feel reassured he might be annoying the thing atleast. Demetri accidently hit it in the eye as it moved it's head. The creature roared in pain, seems it's eyes were stil vunreable.

Mark ran over while the panther was restrained and stabbed it in both it's eyes with his Combat Knife. Enraged, the cat started slashing wildly, and Mark barely avoided getting another gash. He then yelled to Dimitry, "Finish it!"

"I got explosives, but I'll blow Demetri to pieces!" Starr yelled.

Annoyed with the large cat, Starr dropped her M4 and went at it with her hatchet. She came to its back side and took a swing at the panther's large back leg. She hit a vein or tendon, because the panther kicked her hard in the chest. Starr flew through the air and landed almost twenty five feet away from the cat. She couldn't breath very well, slowly her vision started to fade.

As the beast struggled, rampageing another claw gashed Demetri's face leaving a long cut down his right cheek. Demetri fell back, keeping out of reach so he doesn't get another clawing. Grin had come along and brought his sledge hammer down hard on the creature's skull, there was the sound of it cracking and the beast fell, blood pouring from many diffrent wounds.

Running along down to Starr, Demetri slid on soft dirt to stop next to, "[censored]," Demetri said, trying to get her in an easier posistion, or breathing had slowed, he could see she was slipping from consinous.

After seeing Grin finish off the already crippled cat, Mark ran over to Starr and Dimitry and said, "Oh [censored], she's hurt pretty badly." He then pulled out a Stimpack and said, "Think this'll help?"

Demetri shook is head, "I don't know, I only know basic first aid," Demetri said, Duran and the rest had stayed away, they didn't want to get involved and just scouted around to make sure the area was safe. "You could try," Demetri said. Demetr had sorrow in his eyes, it reminded him of what happened about four years ago, so many had died that day...

Mark took off Starr's Combat Armor and injected the shimpack into her chest. He then said, "That'll keep her stable until we can find a doctor or healer that can help."

"In the middle of this [censored] place!?" Demetri had raised his voice, "We are in the middle of no where, and the only signs of civilisation is behind us." Demetri was annoyed, not because of Mark, but because he couldn't do anthing.

Mark then asked Duran, "Do you know of anywhere nearby where we could find a doctor or healer?" Mark felt powerless as well, but decided acting irrational wasn't going to help anyone.

Duran shook his head, "Usually anyone who tries to set up a village out here gets eaten," Duran said, "Though there will most likely be a medical wing in the base, we could treat her wounds better there." Duran looked as saturn came back to them, "I think I spotted the base, not far, we misjudged the distance, it's closer then we thoughts."

Demetri picked up his minigun then Starr holding her gently in his arms, "Lets get going then," Demetri ordered going into the jungle.

Mark walked into the jungle in front of the group, Det on his back. Soon enough they arrived at the base, and Mark's first reaction was to start looking for the medical wing.

In the base, it was overgrown, alot of foliage inside, getting to the medical wing they had found the doors to be locked. Duran brought his shotgun to bear and fired at the lock, pushing it open they went in. Demetri found a bed and laid her in it, Grin had come into the room and placed Starr's gear down on the floor.

Demetri found a medical cabinet, blood packs, most likely unuseable because of their age, Med-X and Stimpacks were the main things in there with a bit of psycho and Buffout, "Think we could use any of these?" Demetri asked Mark, knowing he would be the best suited for this.

Mark said, "I found something better, though we should take those anyway for later." He pulled out a Super Stimpack he'd found in a drawer nearby, a rather rare chem and a lucky find. "Problem is,", he continued, " though it'll heal Starr, she won't be able to fight for at least a day due to the powerful nature of the chemical cocktail involved. I want your ok before I do this Dimitry, as this can be fatal."

"Do it," Demetri said, "Aslong as it help." Demetri watched mark use it, he pulled up a chair and sat next to Starr, waiting to see if she would come around. He didn't really understand why he cared, it was only one person, someone he had met about a week ago, he hadn't even trusted the women because of what see wore, he was pretty much ignorant and just judged people by what he saw. But one had to do that in this world.

walking over to Henry nathan took the binoculars and looked downstream looking back at the man Nathan replied
"alright but aren't you the leader here?" Nathan queried
"my suggestions would be trailing them to the GECK or wherever it is they're going and waiting in the main entrance way until they come back out." nathan supplied coolly
"I somewhat doubt the group will agree to allow the enclave to take the objective here as I saw at least one of the town leader Roy's men passing with them."
Nathans eyes sparked with a predatory fire "so having a back up plan if you intend to link back up with the group would be wise."

Mark injected the Super Stim into Starr. He then said to Dimitri, "She'll be alright, just be ready to inject the Med-X to dull the pain when the Stimpack wears off." He then thought about how everyone treated Starr with suspicion when she first showed up back in Megaton, including himself. Now, Mark considered her, Dimitry and Tom to be his partners and friends, even if the first two were unwilling to reveal the exact details of their past's at the moment.

After Mark had injected the shot, everyone was quiet. Five minutes passed, ten, fifteen. It looked as if Starr wasn't going to make it.

Suddenly her eyes burst open, she started screaming, and tried to move. Starr felt the pain from the panther kicking her in the chest and the super stimpack making her organs work in overdrive. To her everything was a blur, she couldn't focus. She felt hands trying to restrain her, but she fought as hard as she could. After moments of struggling Starr submitted, she couldn't escape the pain she was in. Then she felt another needle being injected near her neck. Slowly the pain subsided. She still couldn't focus, her vision was foggy, and her breathing was heavy.

Mark said, "Welcome back to the world of the living, my friend, you gave us quite a scare. Due to the Super Stimpack I used that most likely saved your life, you won't be able to fight or do any other strenous activity for at least a day, so take it easy, ok?"

Starr could heard Mark's words, although muffled. She just nodded to him, she couldn't talk, she just looked around the room she was in like a lost child. Her breathing was still heavy.

"Where are we?" she asked.

"The Medical Wing of the Military base," Demetri replied, he had finally gotten up and started seeing to the wounds he had suffered, patching up both the cut on his face and the ones on his torse, he looked like a sratching post. "How you feeling?" Demetri asked whilst sercuring his dressing.