The air was thick with smoke. The refinery, now furiously ablaze after two of the chem silos had detonated, poured forth it's noxious contents in broiling soot-black plumes. The screech and wail of alarm sounds both mournfully proclaimed its passing, and screamed desperately for assistance in quenching the mounting inferno. Sliver's heart pounded; the cybershark freelancer knew he had to escape, and escape NOW. Not for the first time, he sent a quick prayer of gratitude that his visor lenses were holographic hard-light and not actual physical material, as heat-smoke unpleasantly rolled over him, and left his softly angular face a smudge-streak mess.

1...2...3...!

He tensed his muscles, ready to spring out from behind the temporary and dangerous cover of the hastily abandoned heavy goods vehicle he had scrambled behind, edged around the corner, and then cursed profusely as adrenaline-fueled muscles instinctively jerked him back as a flash pierced the smoke-filled haze ahead of him. A split second late, a solid beam of energy flashed through the space his head had occupied; flaring as it struck and vaporized a protruding jagged strut of metal that had jutted out from the wreck of the HGV. Sliver's heart thumped wildly as he sought to suppress the trembling that shook his body.

That had been too close...

This had been my most elaborate piece of narrative photoart to date when I originally created it a few months back, using the new tricks and tools I had picked up and been practicing with, and I was really pleased how it turned out. Much tinkering around with the Second Life lighting and environment engine, post-processing with my photo effects tools and use of Photoshop brushes and adding extra touches to the scene such as extra smoke created this shot of my sharksona, Sliver in action, and it definitely looks like a tricky situation!

Brush used with permission for the laser effect: http://darkonelh.deviantart.com/art/LIGHT-BEAM-brushes-106102441

Sliver (c) Jinx Curi / JustASliver

Disclaimer: I do not claim to be the creator of any avatars, textures, sims used as backdrops/scenes or objects/accessories/props used in my photoart, unless explicitly specified. Those are the creations of very talented people, and any copyrights lie solely with them, and the credit for the skill in doing so. I claim only the talent and skill, such as it may be, in modifying my avatars and accessorising them from my SL inventory and creating characters, scenes and stories from them, framing the shots, applying artistic effects and creating any flavour text/themes/accompanying fiction, with the photos that I take.