As the lights went out Joon launched himself at Hillier. He hoped to catch her before she moved, and he did. They grappled in total darkness and he could hear shouting and that keening wail- was that from Howie? 

He had his hands full. Hillier was strong and fighting hard but he brought his knee up into her side, and then as he sensed leverage he brought her down, hard, into the console. Two, three times he smashed her into it, and then sensed she was unconscious. He could hear the guards attempting to find her, and once he thought he might have sensed a rifle butt as they tried to find him, too, and stop him. 

No emergency lights. It was pitch black. 

He heard people moving around, heard people on the catwalk, soldiers barking commands. He quickly divested Hillier of her weapon and then started moving in the direction he'd last seen Maia. Feeling his way around the console board he ran into something- her?- and whispered. 

"Joon?" she said at the same moment. 

He felt an overwhelming sense of relief and embraced her. Then it occurred to him that they were still vulnerable once the lights returned. He started moving back toward Hillier. 

The chaos was punctuated by the sound of Mallory on the comm. 

"Joon. What's going on?"

He didn't dare answer for fear of revealing his position. 

"Commander Hillier. Can you acknowledge?" a deep male voice not ten feet away. 

He wondered if they had night vision. He reached Hillier and propped her up, preparing to use her as a hostage if necessary. 

Then the lights came on. 

Hiller was bleeding from the head- apparently he'd really done a number on her. He felt remorse for a moment before remembering she'd threatened to kill them several times. There were two guards nearby who immediately trained their weapons on him. Several technicians were scurrying about, climbing up to the catwalk and to the exit, or just getting away. Howie was on the other side of the room, floating and still keening. 

"Drop it," one of the soldiers barked. He remembered now he'd taken Hillier's weapon. He maneuvered Hillier more properly in front of him, the weapon in his other hand. The second soldier started moving sideways, as if to flank Joon. 

"Wrong," said Joon, waving his weapon. "You two clowns get back. Way back. And drop your weapons." He held Hillier up for emphasis. 

The soldiers sneered. "Fuck that."

Hillier was awake now, groaning. She seemed to take the situation in quickly, struggled for a moment, then subsided. 

"You won't get out of here," she told Joon. 

"No? We'll see. You sure as hell won't." He sounded more confident than he felt. He could see in his peripheral vision that Howie was moving closer. 

"Joon, what is happening?" Mallory was quite insistent now. 

"We have a situation."

"Is Hillier in command?"

"Oh, Hillier's in command, all right. Commanding a bunch of asshole Intruders who want to shoot us." 

"Hiller." Stella's voice. "What on earth are you doing?"

"Oh, hi Stella, I'm sorry to report that your Hillier is no longer with us. I, on the other hand, have different plans."

"Can you get the Gate closed?" Stella demanded. She was talking to him now, Joon guessed. 

"We were just beginning when this shit happened," piped in Maia. 

"I can't have that Gate closed," interjected Hillier. 

"Why, monster," demanded Mallory. 

"Well, because that's how we got here. And who's the monster? You captured us, experimented on us, won't let us go... what should I do?"

There was silence for a moment. Joon noticed Howie was behind Maia now. 

"Shoot the controls," Hillier instructed her soldiers. 

"Um, ma'am?" the closest one questioned. 

"I SAID SHOOT THE CONTROLS," she screamed. 

Everything happened at once. 

The guards opened fire, spraying bullets into the console. Maia shrieked and ducked behind the console, Hillier screamed in pain as plastic or shrapnel or whatever burned her, and Mallory was shouting something odd. 

"Joon, take cover." 

Not knowing what that meant, he dragged Hiller with him as he ducked behind the console, where Maia was. 

Something strange happened then. A doorway opened in the air, magenta light shone through- it was just like the doorways he'd seen Intruders use before- and a small metallic object came through. It hit the floor with a clank. No one moved. 

Then it exploded.