"Shoot him again", Jeffy yelled, his eyes locked on the slowly rising android.
"I can't", Marx returned, "it only came with one round." He threw the weapon at DANA in a futile attempt to further damage the rampaging automaton.
"Hell with it!", Broski exclaimed, drawing his splazer, "this'll have to do." He took
careful aim and fired, sending DANA sprawling once again to the ground.
"Good shot, Corporal", Marx said, reaching over the bar to clap Broski on the back. "I think you done him in with that one."
"Just dotting the I's and crossing the T's, Sarge. I figured all it would take was a..."
"Guys", Jeffy's strained voice cut in, "he's getting up again."
And indeed he was. Though he'd sustained an inhuman amount of damage, still he struggled to rise. Broski fired off several more shots, yet the android seemed unphased, but for a minor flinch at each
impact. Soon DANA regained his feet, swinging his disfigured head around to stare at them with red, gleaming eyes.
"Any ideas, Sarge?", the corporal asked, still firing but now backing away as well.
"Just one", Marx replied vaulting over the bar. "Run!!"
Broski took the salty veteran's advice and launched himself toward the door, nearly stumbling over Mr. Jeffy as he, too, scrambled for safety. Just as the corporal reached for the function panel, a white
hot beam of energy sliced through his hand and into the door's controls. Broski cursed as the searing pain crept up his arm, but slammed his injured appendage against the panel regardless.
"It's no use", Marx said in an eerily calm voice, "it's fried. He's got us."
Broski clutched his wounded fist against his chest, turning to regard the slowly approaching DANA. The android limped forward. Much of its synthetic flesh had been removed by Marx's blast, lending a
nightmarish quality to its already disturbing appearance.
"Well go ahead, you bastard!!", Broski exclaimed. "Finish us off!!"
DANA kept moving forward, bright eyes dancing above his grotesque, skeletal grin. Jeffy stood paralyzed beside the corporal, the shock of the situation overriding his survival skills. His life rushed
by before his eyes, each moment a blinking vision he tried to embrace.
Thoughts of his childhood flashed by to be replaced by those of his academy days, but at the end, there was only one memory that he could grasp. The memory of his time with Nurse Yahbo. A spark of defiant
rage lit in his soul.
"I'm not going out this way", he said, his steely tone catching the others off guard.
Despite the danger they were in, both Broski and Marx turned to look at the engineering officer, noting the grim set of his jaw. Jeffy returned their stares as he shouldered past Broski and placed himself
between them and the slowly closing bio-mechanical monstrosity.
"It's just you and me now", he informed the disjointed robot in an even tone, "and that's one too many." He clenched his fists at his sides and summoned a picture of his true love to his mind.
"Semper Fo!!", he cried as he launched himself at DANA.
