The energy of his astral body clashed with that of the spirit's in a flash of gold and black power. Kyle felt resistance, the spirit's form seeming armored even in astral space. He forced his hand upward. Pain raked across his back as one of the second set of legs struck him.

The spirit reared, uttering another of its awful shrieks, and Kyle saw his injured water elemental stab upward into the creature's underside. The thing bucked and spun, slamming against the wall and dragging Kyle off his feet. It squealed hideously again, and Kyle struck down with his own feet against its distended belly, pushing with all his might while grabbing what he could of the spirit's head with his right hand.

The spirit curled up all its legs when the head finally gave way. The head, such as it was, tore free of the body. The force of the separation, induced by Kyle's own will, threw him to the side, past the striking legs and on to the floor.

The spirit writhed, its body tossing about uncontrolled, the stench even stronger now, until its movement began to lessen and its form dissolve, streaming and floating off through astral space. In agony, Kyle looked at the head-thing in his hand as it too dispersed, its coherency lost with its life. Suddenly, he realized what he was looking at, and what he'd just fought.

His mind fought against the truth. The legs, the head, the short wings, the long, twitching antennae, the strange shape of the body. Here in the bowels of the hospital, Kyle had just done combat with a vicious, magically powerful spirit. And that spirit had the form of an enormous, hideous, stinking brown cockroach.

Kyle lay there in astral space, his back wracked with pain from the slashing by the cockroach spirit's legs. The pain was severe, but the injuries didn't feel life-threatening. His body, back in the Truman condoplex, had manifested the physical effects of the spirit's astral attack, but Kyle had the pain all to himself. The spirit itself was gone, destroyed. He turned his head to look at the two Knight Errant troopers.

The ork had applied a trauma patch to the mage's shoulder in an attempt to stop the heavy bleeding. Kyle could see the man's aura flickering; he was unconscious and unable to help heal his own body. Kyle didn't know if he himself had enough energy merely to try and stabilize him. If he'd been physically present and this injured, he wouldn't give it a second thought. Being present only in astral space was another matter, for he risked injury to himself if he tried to heal another.

But Kyle didn't have to heal the man, only stop him from dying. He willed himself to float toward the injured mage to examine him more closely.

There. A power focus in the form of a bracelet on the magician's left hand. Without that link from the astral world to the physical one-the circuit of power from astral space, through the focus, into the mage-Kyle wouldn't have been able to help him. But the active focus made all the difference.

Kyle reached out and placed one hand on the man's heart, the other on his left hand at the focus. He would have to slow the man's metabolism, slow his respiration and heart beat, slow his body down to where critical seconds became critical minutes. Kyle picked a rhythm in astral space, the slow beat of ambient energy, and slowed his to match it.

The ork realized something was happening, and stepped back, pulling his sidearm clear as a dull halo of green energy began to surround the injured man. The ork's eyes searched the area, but he could see no target, nothing against which to protect his friend. Then, as the energy flowed around the mage, the ork's radio crackled to life.

Kyle couldn't make out the words that came over it; they were an electronic signal, cold, lifeless, and meaningless to his perceptions in astral space. But the ork's reply was clear.

"Roger, roger!" he shouted into his throat mike. "Officer down, ground floor near the loading dock. I need a trauma alert and another mage. Something's happening down here!"

Kyle felt the injured man respond, his body sliding into synchrony with the rhythm Kyle was providing it. The blood flow slowed, nearly stopping. If Knight Errant could get a medic or another magician with healing spells here in time, he would survive.

"Roger that!" said me ork trooper. "One bug down here. Repeat one bug down!" The radio crackled in reply, and the ork returned his attention to his companion. Kyle backed away. There was little chance the ork would notice him. The emotions and lingering energy from the fight with the spirit were dampening any of Kyle's own aura that might have leaked into the physical world, but he still didn't relish the sensation of being pushed aside by the trooper's Significantly greater mass.

He looked around. There were no physical signs of the magical battle that had just taken place, only the physical effects of the weapons fire and sprayed blood. He heard footsteps running toward him from where the cockroach spirit had been standing. Kyle shot in that direction, wincing at the pain that coursed through him. He quickly passed a field medic and another trooper. Far beyond them, way down the hall, he could see another trooper covering their movement.

Kyle willed himself in that direction, and found the trooper also guarding an injured hospital guard who sat in a small pool of blood. Continuing on, he passed through a pair of swinging doors, and into the what seemed to be the hospital's shipping and receiving area.

There had been a fight here, a pitched battle, from the look of it. Kyle saw six bodies, two were Knight Errant and two seemed to be hospital employees probably caught in the crossfire. The last two looked human at first glance, but even though they were dead and their auras long vanished, Kyle could sense something wrong about them.

"Secure the site!" a familiar voice yelled, "Cover the bodies!"

Kyle turned and saw Lieutenant Facile in full combat gear, one arm bandaged and bloody, leaning against a pile of boxes. A doctor or nurse-Kyle couldn't tell which-tended him. Despite his injury, Facile's aura seemed strong. Kyle quickly floated over to him and slowly made himself visible.

Across me room, a half-dozen weapons instantly turned on him. None fired as he held his hands in a submissive raised position.

"Facile," Kyle said, as the lieutenant stepped in front of the woman assisting him and used his good arm to draw his heavy pistol. "It's Kyle Teller."

"Son of a bitch!" Facile said. "What the frag are you doing-"

"I killed one of the roach spirits down the hall from here." Kyle pointed back in the direction he'd come. "One of your mages got torn up pretty bad, but I was able to stabilize him." He paused to let those words sink in. "Mind telling me what's going on?"

Facile had turned to look in the direction Kyle had pointed, then relaxed and reholstered the weapon. It was another few moments before the frightened nurse resumed work on his arm. "Fraggin' bugs attacked the hospital in force," he told Kyle, gesturing at me two strange bodies now being covered. "At least four true forms and a half-dozen or so of these clean flesh forms."

"Flesh forms? True forms?" Kyle asked him. "What's the difference?"

Facile gestured again at the pair of now covered bodies. "We call these pieces of trash flesh forms. They're possessed by bug spirits, but they look human. Most that get possessed aren't this lucky. True forms just look like fraggin' big versions of the real bug."

"Where's the boy?" Kyle asked.

Facile pointed toward where Kyle took me loading dock door to be. The physical details of me concrete and metal room were nearly indistinguishable to him. “Took him away in a car waiting out there.”

Kyle was about to head in that direction, but Facile stopped him. "Don't bother! I don't even have a make on the car." He pointed at the dead troopers. "They're the only ones who saw it."