Mysterious Mysteries

Mysterious Mysteries
Date of Scene:	01 March 2013
Location:	World of Ruin - Ship Graveyard
Synopsis:	When pigs give maps and Merlin translates, interesting things happen. Including being swept away to an underwater mystery of mysteries.
Thanks to:	Oblivion for GMing a giant lobster.
Cast of Characters:	Zeke, Deidra, Mercade Alexander, Tifa Lockhart, Zia, Avira, Aerith, Emi Dennou, Isaac Hanlon, Percival, Seymour Guado, Ping, Jack Sparrow
Tinyplot:	Manhattan Restoration

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Oblivion has posed:

The Map that two brave souls, Mercade and Isaac took to Merlin showed the location of a hidden, perhaps lost city. Though Merlin warned these brave adventurers that there would be dangers here within this sunken land. That the lobsters there don't like to be disturbed.

Yet within these great ruins, something may lie in wait. Something very important to their quest. The map had magical properties you see. This map not only marked the location, but in the right conditions it would activate its power and transport all ye who look upon to this location. Be they with these brave men or be just adventurers with a curious look. The Map activates as the clock strikes and a magic beam of light glows around all...

The white blue light is bright, at first it feels like flying. Then suddenly falling. Falling and falling, before the sounds around become almost hard to make out. As if they are being muffled out, soon those also fade.

Then suddenly there is water, water everywhere, yet something continues to pull, yanking, swirling. Bubbles float around, before the light itself swirls around those here. Swirling around them each before entering into their bodies.

As they are continued to be pulled down, the light completely vanishes beyond an orb. This orb of light flickers before drifting off and moving around several ruins, before blasting upward and exploding. Lighting the massive area of ships, submarines, and old buildings with a bright glow. The dark sea becomes day, and for those believing they may drown here, they find..

The water is like air. They are able to breath underwater thanks to the magic that brought them here.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
There's nothing like exploring ancient sunken ruins for treasure right after shooting a woman in the kidneys.

Mercade is able to accept the whole 'dangerous ruins holding ancient treasures and a metaphorical chunk of Manhattan' thing. He's already had to do ridiculous things and brave horrible dangers in order to give his own world a chance to exist again.

He's not going to let this stop him. Besides, there's nothing stopping them from bringing a few friends. The word goes out about the situation, and many people from all walks of life have arrived to assist. Mercade appreciates their contributions, and quietly, to himself... Feels a little better about this. Determination or no, good friends at your side help a lot.

The magical map is activated with Shenanigans, and he looks down at the underwater ruins with a mixture of wonder and fear. With a thrill of horror, he realizes... How is he going to breathe? He didn't bring scuba gear this time!

And then he finally sucks in a breath. He can breathe... Water? Mercade looks mildly surprised. "Well. That's convenient." Mercade bubbles. He looks around to the others. "Well guys... What do you think?" He looks to the others. Surely they too would have some opinion about the amazing ruins of the ancient lost civilization. "Well, if they had just found magic pigs earlier, maybe we'd have found Atlantis before..." He jokes.

Avira has posed:
All things considered...

...Avira shouldn't be adventuring today. She really ought to be in bed, recovering from the extremely brutal final round she'd endured. Difficult as the fight was, she actually felt her own performance, for once, was good enough. Evidence of the fight is apparent in the bruising all over her visible skin. Beneath her clothing, bandages and more bruises await. All this was even after a good solid dose of healing magic.

Given who else had come along on this trip, Avira was not alone in the post-beatings department.

The magic of the map feels absolutely exhilerating to Avira. It's the closest she's been to being able to fly again since she finally shed her mutate form. That they're suddenly underwater and able to breathe in this environment is extremely jarring. Avira immediately starts patting herself down for the presence of gills. "Explain this magic pig thing to me again, Mercade."

Jack Sparrow has posed:

Jack Sparrow had located the men with the map and had invited himself, sort of like a remora. It is not beyond conception after all that the Pearl might have sunk or been forced down somehow; it is also certainly true that if you need to find something in the sea, friendship with mermaids would be the way to go.

Jack Sparrow's beard and dreads are still full of air bubbles, giving him a mildly ironic demeanor even as he struggles with one hand to firmly pin the tricorn hat on his head in place.

"I'm not drowning," he informs Mercade.

Moments pass. Jack seems to be considering matters. "That's different."

He seems interested in the question rendered by Avira, judging by the way his eyes track towards the woman.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart is a bit surprised that she can breath underwater, honestly. But after being transformed into a jaguar, everything is possible in the multiverse, erally. Called upon to help, and discover potential treasures, not to mention a presisting rumor it might be connected to a world shard, and the barmaid took the bait (pun intended) to dive (pun intended) into the depths of the oceans (pun... wait no puns here).

Swimming along with the rest of the group, she nods to Mercade "That's quite amazing, honestly. How many more wonders like this are still unexplored in the multiverse..." Its interesting to know there might not be a finite number of them either.

Zia has posed:
It doesn't take much to draw Zia into being there as the map is activated - all it takes is the mere mention of something that might help to rebuild her world. Her own personal quests have come up with only sparce leads, so whatever magic the map contains seems a worthwhile use of her time. So, the white-skinned former resident of Manhattan is close enough when the magic activates, her ear twitching with the tick of the clock.

The sudden feeling of being pulled by magic is all too familiar. It's almost enough to bring on a bout of deja vu, especially with the way the water catches her, swirling those bubbles up behind her path. Didn't this happen before? It's hard to remember a dream, but it seems familiar. Just like in that dream, she doesn't seem to have any fear of the water around her, and where there should be pressure and cold and a struggle to breathe... there is none.

The feeling of being under water is entirely different, though. Normally, gargoyles are at home in the sky, and this... feels weird. Her wings fan out, as if trying to find balance, but it doesn't seem to work quite well. Her arms and legs tread the water, but it seems like she doesn't need to do much in order to keep herself hovering in one place. Her eyes look out towards the 'ruins', and it's Mercade's question that catches her, "This doesnae look like any lost city Ah've ever seen." She hesitates, blinking, "It looks like a graveyard."

Aerith has posed:
Aerith couldn't help but wonder if this was really possible, even though she certainly was breathing underwater. The ruins before her were expansive, and it was difficult to really believe a world shard was somewhere in here. Zia did have a point though... it did look like a massive effigy. Aerith shook her head to clear the foreboding thoughts and made her way forward. "So you're suddenly an explorer now, Tifa?"

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart looks over to Aerith "While a certain lady has been gone missing because of training and pilgrimage, a certain barmaid has been busy with various adventures like an animal kingdom, the hades tournament, a fire crystal powered airship, and more." She prods her friend playfully.

Aerith has posed:
Aerith giggled at the poke. "Well I've been to Flourgis, had to take care of something down there." That made her wonder how Evja was doing, but she cleared her mind of it. Shard to find. "So then, how long do you think this one will take?" After all, this wasn't her first time going for a world shard.

Percival has posed:
The magical descent into the depths of the unknown would be harrowing even for the most veteran boatswain. For a mythical creature, it was no less so. In fact, it was even moreso. The Gargoyle could barely swim. Oh he could flail, and he could paddle. He could even drown. By his frenzied reaction to the unbidden descent, it could even be said that he'd be an expert drowner; as he closed his eyes and waited for the end to come.

And then suprise! He didn't drown. It took him some time to realize that he was not in fact dead. And even longer before he mustered the courage to open his eyes. He'd already decided that he 'hated' this adventure. All of his trepidation melted away in an instant as he finally had the sense to register the wonders that lay before him. Maybe this wouldn't be so terrible after all.

Bubbles. As he got used to breathing and seeing the bubbles rise from his throat, he then began to experiment with speaking by answering Mercade. "What I think Mercade is that you found the final resting place of those who suffered the wrath of Poseidon."

He experimentally tries to use his wings to aid in his paddling. "Do you happen to know if we have a time limit, before that little bauble decides to withdraw its protection?"

Seymour Guado has posed:
A man with strange exotic blue hair would approach the scene with two of his guado companions, representing Yevon these three seemed to be on a mission having commissioned a small boat to traverse this sunken grave yard. The smell of death still lingered there, the men were fearing they'd not make it out and their ship would join these wrecks.
Not today it seemed a man in the crows nest spotted the light as many crew members began praying to Yevon, a superstitious bunch of Sailing Yevonites but loyal. He would soon approach an area where he could disembark feeling the strange magics at work, he still didn't require them to survive underwater although not everyone knew that little secret, he found himself with his two followers there amongst all these new people.
Taking a knee he presented the prayer of Yevon "Greetings to you all.. I am Maester Seymour Guado.."
Rising he looked around curiousily at the ancient ruins and the fact they were all underwater breathing "It seems me and my fellow Yevonites have stumbled onto something.."

Isaac Hanlon has posed:
Isaac should probably be lying down right now, too. Don't worry, Avira; you aren't alone. However, as the one who pigged up the map (that's totally a verb, shut up), he figures he should be along.

Isaac is panicked as soon as he appears underwater. It isn't even because he's worried about drowning -- he's worried about his prized possession, the piece of electronics in his pocket. He's waterproofed it, sure, but below a certain depth, the ocean really gives no shits about what sorts of protection you put on your delicate electronics.

Except it works. Isaac holds it in two hands and frowns severely at it. Very, very severely. He pokes at his tablet a bit, scrolling through things.

"It's simple. The Truffle Pin summons a magic pig that pigs up cool stuff," Isaac asides to Avira. He points at the pin, attached to his shirt. He's lacking his usual long coat; it's being repaired. "I magicked up a pig and it pigged up a page of something, and Merlin said it was Atlantean. One thing led to another, and here we are, because magic pig."

He pauses.

"You know, it occurs to me that the water dungeon is always the most annoying one," Isaac adds thoughtfully.

Emi Dennou has posed:
Emi is hesitant to go to underwatertopia when she can't even swim. But she can stick with the group until they reach the location until OH SHIT SUDDENLY THEY ARE IN UNDERWATERTOPIA. Eyes bulging, Emi grabs at her throat and kicks uselessly around her, eyes bulging--and then she pauses, she sniffs once, and then lets go of her throat.

"...This one can breathe?" SHe rubs at her throat, but she is distinctly being pushed around by the water rather than actually swimming. She may, in fact, be gradually sinking to the floor. Underwater, hr electricity powers are probably not going to be very helpful either.

"Perhaps this was a poor choice for The Network." Emi looks down, and then over to Jack Sparorw.

"Do you not know how to swim either? Do you wish to be drown-buddies?, The Network inquires semi-seriously."

sink sink sink.

Deidra has posed:
Deidra had to admit the hisotrian in her was curious about this job, what worse could happen to her after what she'd already been through right? She has kept up with her alli...friends? Clan? Family? Well they were what she got and she was happy for the most part. Sop here she along side Mercade though she's got a black and wide bandana with a skull and crossbones on it. Why the heck not? Right?

"I'm warty but well nothing ventured nothing gained Mercade." Avira gets a look over and she gets a bit of a look it seems she was thinking the same thing about the magical pigs.

Jack Sparrow gets a bit of a look for a moment but only a moment she's not sure what to think of that guy but he seems a bit witty at least?

Zia does get her attention. "Ya it does look look like that Zia and who knows what we could wake up but we need to press on. Good to see you again by the way."

Ping has posed:
Even after several trips, Ping just has not yet managed to get the hang of traversing the interdimensional strata. One of these magical trips is going to land him in the innards of a whale, the crater of a volcano, or deep beneath the crushing weight of an entire ocean. His fear has been realized at last, it seems, and for a moment grace completely abandons him.

As the swirl of water takes hold of him and plunges him through a frothy, bubbling whirlpool, Ping flails helplessly, arms and legs, and holds possessively onto his breath. When that breath finally fails him, reflex forces him to gasp a lung full of water... water that is surprisingly breathable. His stills and his eyes open a moment later, observing the relative calmness of his companions. He hopes his flailing hasn't made a scene. His cheeks blush with a red hue as he looks over the people near him.

For some reason, he is upside-down compared to them, head pointed straight toward the ruins below. He quickly dog-paddles to right himself, hoping nobody noticed.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"Well..." Mercade says in response to Avira, but Isaac has this mostly covered. "Remember how Isaac was having problems with his broadcast with Pig Noise invading his broadcast? Once we beat them back, one of them dropped him that truffle pin thing. Apparently he can use it to summon a magic pig to get stuff." Mercade looks over to the enigmatic pirate who joined their party for the event. "I know, this is an unusual situation. I'm not going to question it through."

Tifa's words make him smile faintly. "There's got to be a lot of lost things out there in these worlds. I just wish..." Mercade sighs. "It were under better circumstances."

Zia shows the same confusion he did for a moment, and he nods in response to her. "It... kind of does. It's kind of morbid, but I guess that might... explain some things."

Mercade flips himself over to Ping, clapping him on the shoulder and smiling to him. He knows the feeling, man. He's been there. "You going to be okay?" He asks.

Percival's question is rather pointed. "Uhhhhh... Isaac?" Mercade says as he looks to his go-to for magical stuff. He has apps for this. The appearance of Seymour causes Mercade to blink, but he sure isn't going to argue. "Uh... thank you for your help, Maester. Much obliged." Mercade says.

Well. Now they have a small army of people who are enchanted to survive down here. "Well... We're not going to solve this standing around. Let's start looking around." If no one else take the lead, he will.

Isaac Hanlon has posed:
"I'll tell you when it starts to run out," Isaac asides. "It should be pretty obvious when the protection stops being protecty."

He hopes.

Avira has posed:
Avira laughs, "Yeah, I definitely remember the Pig Invasion in the..." She trails off. That...had been run by DJ Zero, hadn't it?

"'Pigs up cool stuff.'" Avira repeats in a skeptical tone that suggests she's probably not buying this unless she sees it happen. Half of this is because she certainly wants to see this pin demonstrated to her at one point because magical search pigs sounds pretty awesome. "Well, something certainly worked."

Experimentally, she jumps to test out the "gravity" down here. "...fellow Yevonites? Uh, that one I don't follow, actually..."

Slowly she turns to look at Jack, meeting his eyes briefly. There's a momentary look of confusion on her face. Many people here, Seymour included, she had recognized. This guy, however, "Um. Who are you, if you don't mind me asking?"

Deidra has posed:
Deidra says "I heard about that. I seemed to have missed all the fun but well I was sleeping." She can't fight that after all given what she is what she is. She looks over th Ping and grins she friends to be friendly for the most part right? Most people are hopefully here to help but she can never tell who has experiance with non humans before and who doesn't.

"So long is no one snatches the idol off the pedistal we should be fine right?"

A bit of humor for the manhattanites before they move out.

Percival has posed:
"So what you're telling me then, is our fate rests in the hands of pig magic." The big oaf tended to range towards Zia and Deidra, perhaps because he's trying, not so subtly, taking mental notes of how they tried to propel themselves through the water. What worked, and what didn't, before he would attempt such. "That's comforting."

And so he continued to just blatantly copy all of their movements for a crash course in swimming, Gargoyle style. As Emi speaks to Jack, he idly remarks in a sort of half-joking fashion. "If he doesn't want to be, then I'll be your drown-buddy."

Zeke has posed:
Zeke had thought going into this he might find out about a girl. Heard Atlantis and Atlantica were the same place so took the plunge. OK fine he didn't think it would be uite so /litteral/ what with the sudden water and whatnot, but he's had to deal with suddenly needing to swim in his full clothes before. then there's a sense of direction and pulling.

At first he held his breath while trying to figure out where they were and blew a stream of bubbles. OK good that way Up. Dear God that's a long way up. How'd Ariel manage the trip if this was the portal? Hm wait... if she had Mermaid help. Oh dear this wans't going to be good. He was weighed down by his clothes and his weapons wer a liability here. Yet Zeke cast about looking to see if there was anything in his future but a slow death.

Tick Tick Tick Tick. His lungs burned and finally he exhailed. Automatically he inhailed.... and.. Didn't drownd. "Well..." He wasn't sure if he was heard or not but seeing ashe could breath and walk he started towards where he saw others. "This is new."

Oblivion has posed:

A few light wisps gathered together in order to create an orb of light that bobbed around in the water, as if trying to attract those who came, before whisking down deeper into the waters. It moved around an old sunken sail boat, around a few odd and end ships. Before moving over to a ruin, where it hovered there and flickered a few times.

The ruin itself was massive and dark aqua blue. It looked like giant claws that extended up high above reaching for the very sky that could not be seen. The ruins themselves had odd markings along the surface, an ancient language long forgotten. Pieces of old lumber also laid here, masses cracked in half, cannon balls, swords, even some gold coins!

Yet there the orb remained, flickering. As if trying to tell them something. It just flickered and hovered there. Lighting those ancient ruins and odd markings.

Zia has posed:
As much as Zia might have an alignment with water, it is only slightly helpful for a creature who is far more used to dealing with air and wind. Her wings only seem to cause more drag then good, and she quickly tucks them in against her body, but it doesn't seem to actually stop her from hovering there. Instant flight, no wings required. Hrm.

It's less of a matter of swimming, and more a matter of subtle movements. Even so, she looks to the other gargoyles, checking on how they are doing. "Ye all right there?" She asks of Persival, moving with her arms to get a bit closer to her resident 'guardian'.

Seeing the light wisp off into the darker recesses of the water, Zia glances back at the others, "So... follow the bouncin ball?" She points, and then makes for swimming forward after it, kicking her legs out ackwardly. Gargoyle feet - not made for swimming. "Nice te see ye, too lass. Ah'll try te be careful nae te repeat the failings of other grand adventurers." Zia's geek is showing as she joins in the amusement.

"Anyone else find this place a little... creepy?" She asks, feet finally coming to settle on the sandy floor, kicking it up like dust. Crouching down, Zia plucks up one of the coins, looking at it. "Ah wonder wha era these are even from?"

Aerith has posed:
Aerith too took note of the rather interesting ball of light, and decided it was important enough to follow. She motioned to Tifa, made sure she saw it too, and then got moving. When she got there though, it was nothing short of eerie. "I second that one... those claws look a bit too realistic to me."

Zeke has posed:
Zeke caught sight of the sailboat and tched involentarily while mentally assessing whether it could be salvaged (assuming of course one could get it out of the water.) Then he caught sight of Sparrow.

"Oi!" He tried waving an arm, frowning at the diffrences in how he moved here. It was thicker than air but.... not nearly as thick as crush depths should have been. Some sort of magic. "Fancy bumpin int'ya down here mate." Nevermind he wasn't all that pleased with Jacks profession, or his comrads. "Was kinda hopin t'bump int'ya fer a bit of a job in Tourtuga." That is assuming they made it out of here. He hated trusting everything to fickle and unknown magics." Bounce. Bounce. He didn't know it but Zeke moved much like one would on the moon. Then Zia asked if anything and or anyone felt creeped out. "Oh just the wee fact I'm underwater breathin it like air an bouncin 'long barely encumbered whre I should be crushed like an egg. Nothin creepy 'tall.."

Deidra has posed:
Deidra pauses at the arrival of Zeke she'd seen him around a few times and also Zeke might realise there's several Gargyols here pretty quickly also the aformationed Pirate crossbone bandana she's wearing. She's looking about the ruion taking careful intrest a fair bit of careful interest s she looks over the markings and even has her pad out taking images of things here and she pauses looking snaging a few coins and even a sword that seems intact as well you never know right?

She looks back to Zia amnd she says "I'm doing all right Zia and it is creepy , but what can you expect humm judging from the weapony I'd say maybe somewhere from the 1600s to the 1800s somewhere? I'll see if I can date the coins later."

But there goes the bouning ball right? "Isaac I never seen makrings like these before... You got any ideas about these?"

Jack Sparrow has posed:

Jack Sparrow is surrounded by pulchrutidinous women but is not, at this precise moment, taking advantage; the water thing bothers him more strongly.

Especially when the wizard man starts saying they'll know when it begins running out.

Then a mast looms, and Jack pushes forwards, wriggling past the people with the map. "Excuse me, I've business down that way," he says, largely because in the water he can't just run past people, and starts to wade forwards, ridiculously.

He pauses for a moment, considering things, his waistcoat trailing behind him. He then looks over towards Zeke, saying to him with passing puzzlement, "How did - No, no, never mind. Allez..."

And then Jack crouches down as if he's executing a SOLDIER-perfect squat-thrust.

"OOP!" And he jumps forwards, towards the wreckage, trailing some bubbles behind him. And moving sort of in slow motion but we don't always get what we want, do we? (Though it is said that regular effort may reveal what, in fact, you need.)

Seymour Guado has posed:
The Guado Maester recognising a few faces would bow his head to them in recognition, the last time he had seen them he had covered the escape from an ancient fiend. He wasn't seen much after that, though him being there meant he escaped atleast looking virtually unscathed walking on he seemed to focus on the ruins for now.
Introduced he didn't seem to have these peoples keen interest it was strange to him comming from a land where they fawned over him, but what was more pressing was these ruins and the magic keeping them safe something powerful must be kept there and he wanted to find out what.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart nods as she swims after the others and Aerith "I'd rather not stick around too long, at least not enough for them to get back to life and decide that we'rd a perfect breakfast." But you know that's going to happen with one monster on another while down here...

Which makes her wonder how they would fight anyway, she's good with her feet on the ground, in here there's not much of that. Swimming around won't have the same impact with her punches and kicks, and not to mention where will she piledrive them?

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Oh, the light will handle the leading, then. Mercade grimaces for a moment, thoughts of certain legends about malevolent lights drawing people to their doom on his mind... But there isn't much of a choice. Jack immediately embarks as well, and far be it for Mercade to disagree with the pirate. They have native terrain bonuses here. He agrees with his choice.

Mercade looks to Zia, and then back to the ball. "Looks like it..." He says. With a frown, Mercade nods to Zia. "You're not the only one. I feel like I'm walking on a graveyard... But I haven't explored a lot of ancient ruins, this might be natural." He sounds more like he's reassuring himself than anything else.

He points to the ancient language slab. "Hey Isaac, think you can translate that? It might give us a hint on what we're looking at here."

Emi Dennou has posed:
Emi waits a few moments to see if Jack Sparrow will be her drown buddy. He just ignores her to vault into danger! Emi hangs her head.

"Thank you, Percival." She says, grabbing onto one of Percival's arms. Her own concern with her inability to swim has occupied her for long enough to miss Ping's troubles. She looks towards the orb wondering if it's a save point, perhaps.

"Please drown--" She points towards Mercade. "After Mercade, we wish to be nearby in case there are clues to be found."

She looks about a bit and adds, "Also if you could, please drown by the gold coins so we could make some extra cash, The Network requests politely."

Avira has posed:
Seems Jack's too busy for introductions. Mercade gets a look of 'who is this dude you brought along with us'?

For a few steps Avira starts to walk, which takes too darn long and looks like she's doing so in slow motion. She gives up on this after a few seconds before shifting so she can swim her way along. "Mercade, the glowing light is part of the map, right? And not some kind of malicious underwater will-o-wisp?"

Dipping down, Avira scoops a fingerless-gloved hand through the sea floor. "Gold coins?" she says innocently, scooping them out of the sand, "What cold coins?" Small habit picked up from Angantyr, clearly. Leave no stone unlooted.

Ping has posed:
Ping blushes a bit at Mercade's clap on his shoulder but nods his head affirmatively, "Oh yeah, you know me." He coughs lightly (coughing underwater) and tries to play it off, "Like an oxe, hehe..." He rolls his eyes and shakes his head and whispers to himself, "Think before you speak..."

After recovering from his embarassment, Ping takes a moment to take in his surroundings. He is one that can still find wonder and awe in the world, captivated by beauty and enchanted by mystery. The bubbles, the fish, the light broken up into dancing ribbons by the movement of the water, they all manage to steal his attention. And of course, Deidra does, too. He lifts his hand and waves a warm, though shy wave toward her.

It's only a moment, though, as another movement in the water steals his fleeting attention, again.

Isaac Hanlon has posed:
Slowly, the clues come together, Avira--!!

"Pigs up cool stuff," he repeats, with a nod. "It's a thing.

Isaac peers as Emi... sinks. "Just kick your legs and, uh, paddle." He demonstrates. Doggypaddle? Dennoupaddle?! Percival seems to have it handled though. That's a good thing. Isaac shrugs at Deidra and Mercade and swims closer, getting near the ruins covered in the ancient language. "Might be ancient Atlantean. I've got a sample from Merlin's translation, let me see if I can put a magic cipher together or something." He treads water near the nearest intact section of the text and starts playing around with his tablet. He's cooking up a spell so he can take a picture and translate it on the screen!

"Might be a malicious underwater will-o'-the-wisp, don't touch it," Isaac calls.

Percival has posed:
"I'm not sure, it all feels so unnatural. I don't think our kind were meant for life at sea. Much less under the sea." He made a poor sort of Guardian, as things tended to stand. His movements were severely hampered underwater, and he was only just getting the hang of it. Swimming a bit lower, he picks up a Falcata that he notices laying unnoticed within this watery grave. Picking it up, he takes a moment to admire its archaic craftsmanship, before allowing it to come to rest once again on the ocean floor.

Noting the orb is moving on its merry way, after Zia calls attention to it, he continues to paddle after them. He finally seemed to realize that attempting to move with his wings was hopeless, and allowed them to retract and fold about him. Still, they tended to move and float about with a mind of their own.

"It feels like we're not supposed to be here. I'll take no memento, no trophy from this hoard, Zia." It was likely bad enough that he even disturbed the blade.

And then Perci suddenly founded himself anchored down by Emi. Well at the very least it made walking along the ocean floor a bit easier. At her comment though, it is very hard to keep a straight face. "If aught can be endeavoured, Emi, then I will make every effort. But why not the platinum? Is my life is to be spent, then it should not be done so cheaply."

The big Gargoyle watches Isaac with some interest, as he cooks up his spell. Perhaps because he's just curious about how his magic works.

Oblivion has posed:

The text continues to be shimmered by the orb floating above. The translation does Old Guardian, forever..</span>' before that too seems to have been taken away by time.

There are also plenty of gold coins here, dates ranging from all types of eras really.

There was a minor rumble, but it was hard to tell where it came from. The orb though was starting to dim down. Perhaps the rumble came from it?

Zeke has posed:
"Aye." Zeke looked over the Ship and it's Gold. "An ill thing to take from wht the sea has claimed even if it weren't magic that lets us travel here. NO tellin what might break th'spell." Zeke's voice was level as he bounced along with ell, or at least hopefully well, timed shoves. In trueth he was bumbling along... though he didn ave a sort of grace about him. OK fine fine he's just as not native ot this as everyone else, but he was taking notes and trying to correct as he went along!

"A fine ship at least it probably was a fine ship afore it got punched fulla holes and drug under." He pointed to diffrent spots. "Interesting how it broke 'part. Curious." He hoped he was wrong and that WASN'T some giant whatsit that did the breaking and was just the ship breaking itself when it hit the floor.

He didn't notice the rumbling. Perhapshe was too focused on figuring out how the ship broke apart. Ater all it looked awefly close to 'his end' of the worlds. IE something from the 17th centuryy. "Curious..." He tried to bounce/leap/etc closer to see if he could figure out the why of the breakup. "Touch nothing please. All of you. This wreck might tell us something important but this... Leave the treasure be."

Zia has posed:
Managing a smirk, Zia looks over at Zeke through the light cast by the magic keeping them down here. "Aye, there isnae anythin creepy aboot tha, is there, lad?" She blows a few bubbles in his direction, "Then again, this is commin from the lad who was creeped out by dancin, so ye'll excuse me if Ah dinnae marvel at yer courage."

With a glance back, the gargoyle checks up on the familiar faces, but does notice one that isn't so much so. The Guado and his entourage seem like new additions, and certainly not creatures from her world. "Ye'll havete excuse the rush, Ah dinnae think any of us are too keen on bein turned inte fish food." Not that she doesn't appreciate the help either way, but, you know. They are kind of on a timer, at least... more than likely.

Squinting towards the writing, she takes only a few steps to look around, nudging some sand with her toes to see if anything lies beneath it. There's something familiar about the writing though. Then again, it eludes her as it likely does most of the others, so she'll just leave the translation to the apparent expert in jibberish.

The coin is turned in her taloned fingers, but Zia only takes this one, leaving others still lying on the sandy ocean floor. Maybe if it weren't for that rumble, she might have gathered more, but instead, her ear twitches, head turning. "Hrm." Curious. It could be anything down here, really, even one of these dead ships settling. "Uh, the light's gettin darker." Way to state the obvious.

Aerith has posed:
Okay, rumble. Suspicious sign, there. Aerith takes note of it for later, as well as the fact that yes, there is a guardian here. The problem now lies in the fact that she can't use fire or thunder magic down here, there's only ice to be had. And her staff work won't really help at all... so what could she do?

No, talk about that later. "Tifa, maybe we should get away from the glowy thing before something bad happens."

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart nods to Aerith, standing a safe distance from the stone while the others try to decipher it "That's why I'm keeping watch..." She's swimming in the back. Wasn't there a sport that you needed to stay underwater for long periods of time? She's starting to feel that way a bit although she's not holding her breath either. So odd really.

Seymour Guado has posed:
The Maester of Yevon was not easily distracted by gold coins, moving on he looked for something more there was likely something more valuable hidden down here, though not straying too far from the group he seemed content to peer around in curiousity.
Seymour felt the rumbling his eyes searching for the source, deciding he gave the command to his two followers "Look around quickly.. we might only have a small open window find something that looks to have power or some ancient texts, we should be able to bring something home from this."
He seemed concerned now normally rumbling was never good but for now he was content in his search for whatever had enough power down that it needed to be protected in such a strange manner.

Ping has posed:
Ping is still lost in wonder at his sunken surroundings, long enough that it takes him several moments to realize that folks are taking off without him. He looks off after Mercade and calls out,

"Hey guys, wait up!"

Soon he has fallen in beside Percival and Emi, glad to see The Network has received some assistance in her swimming difficulties from the Knight Errant Gargoyle. As Ping motors about through the water with graceful swimming strokes, following Jack and Mercade's lead, one last adventurer might be lost in the bubbles he leaves in his wake.

The bravest cricket cricket-kind ever knew (that Jiminy can't hold a candle to this cricket) swims his little heart out. The tiny bug is quickly exhausted, tough, pausing to catch his little bug breath. A small fish is drawn to the bug's struggle and moves in to scoop up an easy lunch. However, the bug has been studying the deft movements of a certain barmaid recently and as the fish comes in for his meal, the little cricket performs a deft backflip and alights on the fish's back. Using the fish's dorsal fin as a rudder, the cricket guides it like a knife through the water. Now he's travelling in style.

Jack Sparrow has posed:

Mid-air (OK, mid-water) Jack frowns, turning his head back towards the imp who had greeted him, shading his eyes and peering. "Ah, so that WAS one of them," he says to himself, still sailing gracefully through the water.

He reaches for something at his hip; a compass perhaps.

He consults it intently, ignoring the buckets of treasure nearby. Slowly he sinks back towards the ground, flicking the casing of the compass once or twice, looking upwards as he hears it remarked about the light. "Alexander, mate, you can't be doing diving at night."

Holstering his compass, he reaches up to re-seat his hat with one hand, looking deflated.

"Drown buddy, eh? You're a morbid imp," he informs Emi as he slinks nearer to the cluster of people.

Emi Dennou has posed:
Emi is pretty focused on her surroundings. It helps when you can't really move too well and have someone to drag you around for you. Emi is also paying special attention to any coins she can grab, which she aptly steals whenever she gets a solid opportunity. She says, "Well, we are not actually drowning." Emi says. "As you likely know, drowning is not the act of failing to swim but the act of perishing due to excess fluids in one's lungs. This spell seems to protect us from that, though we are not certain how we are able to talk all the same."

Magic, it's magical.

She stuffs crap in her pockets and then pauses. She's seeing movement. "The claws..."

Emi frowns deeply. "...They went...down somehow," She looks over to Percival, nodding to him. "Something's coming! Be careful!"

She of course, aims to charge ahead, dragging Percival along with her so that she can investigate what happened properly, heedless--for the moment--of the obvious danger.

Emi Dennou has posed:
Emi Dennou looks towards Sparrow and nods to him. "Yes, that is probably not inaccurate of a descriptor. The Network introduces themselves as 'Dennou', this one being Emi." She probably did this before charging ahead though.

Percival has posed:
The Gargoyle watches the results of Isaac's spell, and just like that the trepidation returned. Between the light dimming and the rumbling, it all just seemed so very ominous. Maybe he even clung to Emi just a bit tighter. Though not cowardly by nature the idea of drowning at sea was just 'not' exactly how he wanted to go. What did Isaac do? What was going on? He peers at the runes for a bit longer, his gaze lingering.

"I hope that was not ill done, else I may very well be having to compete against Mercade in 'whom drowns first'. It is unfortunately a contest we can only hold once." Was that a cricket hanging onto a fish? Maybe he was hallucinating too now.

"Wait, what's coming Emi?" Charging ahead was perhaps not his favorite reaction to the unknown, but he trusted her enough that he was actually trying to keep pace, rather than pry her off. Not the wisest move perhaps, but she hadn't steered him wrong yet. He just hoped that she wouldn't forget how electricity functions down here, and had an accidental discharge if it turned out to be an actual threat.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"I don't know, Avira. This is my first magical underwater transportation map." Mercade replies to Avira, not with sarcasm but with an edge of shared concern. Ping gets Mercade to shake his head. "Relax, Ping. You'll be fine." As fine as any of us down here, he mentally notes.

The shift of the orb to dim causes him for frown. "No, Mr. Sparrow. I don't think I want to be caught without light here." He does, however, pull out a flashlight. "Look. No one's drowning today. I am really bad at funerals." He yells over his shoulder at all the morbid talk... And then Emi warns of danger. "Huh?" Mercade says, eloquently, and flicks on the flashlight, falling back from the light as he looks around for some hint of what they're in for,

Deidra has posed:
Deidra is taking all of it down she can but is having problems making it out she does manage to get some basic translation here. She looks and realises t teh various eras on the coins. She'll hang on to them why not right? But she's not about to load herself down getting greedy would be foolish. She's got enough and that's not really why they are here right? She keeps up with the group and looks to Zeke and nods "I only had a few coins for dating and i'm done with that."

She looks over the place some more and has to agree how damn creepy it is Zia is right to be sure. "it is and humm Olrd guardian forever?"

She does glance over to Mei, Ping and Percival all and all this group was gathering mostly reliable or at least non crazy though Seymour and Jack are rather large unknowns.

"If she says something's coming we should trust ht on that one."

"Your help is appicated Ping don't worry."

She looks over to the pirate so his name's Sparrow huh?

"Ya funerals are bad, I don't feel like going to go to or be the main attraction of one."

Avira has posed:
"We better be careful, then." Avira says cautiously, "Because underwater will-o-whisps might really be a thing." Knowing that they'll have to keep moving, she scoops up her last coin, stuffing them into her pockets and pouches before righting herself slightly.

Emi goes on about something that Avira's currently not picking up on-heck, it's not something anybody is picking up on. She frowns. "What went down exactly..."

Isaac Hanlon has posed:
Isaac's spell appears a lot like talking to himself while performing a particularly deft feat of computer programming. There's a faint blueish glimmer and a flicker like a camera flash when he does it.

"Something like 'Old Guardian, forever.' Looks too worn to make out much more. Any better samples?" He starts swimming around.

Oblivion has posed:

Emi goes to find where the claws went and her warnings hopefully heard by the others. As soon there was another rumble along with a strange high pitch hissing sound. As the light continued to fade, six red orbs of light emerge in the darkness. There was a clicking sound, then another clicking sound.

The runes on the ruin wall started to glow bright blue along with the image, before the light started to fade away. Soon though the clicking grew louder and a glow started to form behind the ruin structures and old sea worthy vessels. Blue lines started to glow across the massive aqua green stone creature that was rising above everyone, starting to now come into view for all to see.

It had two large pincer claws and two smaller ones it clicked at random and was staring down at them. It would seem its surprise attack was foiled, but obvious its plan as it slashed its claw at one of the ruin buildings that went tumbling down for the group and threatening to destroy the stone wall with the writings on it.

Zeke has posed:
"Oi?" Zeke lookedd up from his musing. "Wha'ts this about...." He frowned at how dim it'd gotten while he was lost in his own thoughts before trying to get with the group. Nevermind he still felt like a tagalong he was /NOT/ going to sit and be fish kibble. "Next time i see that lass I'm going to..."

Do what? He didn't hit women as a general rule and for all he knew this whatever was the Atlantica equivilent of a guard dog that liked Arel and was going to be ever so happy to show them the door.... Shore. Whatever the local metaphore was.

Sword was in hand, for whatever good it was. "Whoever picked coins up. I'm going to ask you to drop them. Now and bounce.. .walk... or whatever away from them. I don't care why jus somethin down here dunna like souvinere huntin."

Then the runewall started glowing. "Light's good...." Zeke frowned at the giant crab thing. "Giant crab monster thing not so good." The whole time he had a deadpan voice about him. Hm. Wonder if muskets worked down here. He doubted it, but why not?
"Jack!" He hoped to catch Sparrow's attention, seeing as he was the only other swab from the Crarribean. "Barrel of fresh rum to whoever kills that thing!"

And then he drew pistol and fired. Drew another pistol and fired. All while bounicing along trying to find somewhere to get that wouldn't be in the stampeed/trample zone.

Aerith has posed:
Okay, good. She figured it was time for this anyway.

Aerith clenched her fists, the materia on her bracelets lighting up, firing on all cylinders. Time to get this party started. First things first though, she channeled her energy through one of her materia and sent its power toward her friend, as well as Zia. She looked like she'd need it.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart eeps a bit at first when the Mache-Lobsert appears. Then she wonders how many days it would take to eat all of that if she could cook it for the bar. "Hey, think we can dine on crab at the bar, Mercade?" She asks outloud. Although, its mechanical, not likely to happen.

At any rate, attack time! She uses a nearby rock to launch herself fist first at the mechanical menace. She's testing out its durability first, wanting to see if it can be cracked. She doubts it, but maybe she can hit a weak point too.

Jack Sparrow has posed:

"Captain," Jack corrects Mercade, which takes precedence over everything. "Captain, if you please." Then towards Emi, he muses, "That sounds like a Nipponaise name. Strange. I thought they didn't have imps out there."

The water seems different then. Jack reaches up, touching his beard, stroking it thoughtfully. Something about this, the pirate thinks, is wrong. He hears a click; then another. When Emi runs off and ahead, he turns slowly, looking in the direction where the Dennou went.

The creature reveals itself, looming upwards, the size of a whale and with strength enough to crush stonework. Jack leans backwards about ten degrees, his upper lip curling back a bit as he staggers in the backwash of the thing's motion. He breathes in a lung ful of sorcerously enchanted water and hears the valiant cry of the other sailor-man. Sees his weapon fire (somehow, he thinks, underneath the water). Watches the weapons seem to 'spang' off the shells.

He raises an index finger. "Zeke, old salt, I want you to know that I shall always remember your valiant sacrifice."

He then turns around towards Deidra and the Cathayan soldier-boy she's standing near. Then he informs them, with all great solemnity, "We're leaving."

Jack Sparrow then begins running from the monster.

Avira has posed:
Her focus returns. Skoll would be far more proud of this behavior than that of a few seconds ago when she was obviously completely unknowing of the mechanical leviathan lying in wait. Gradually, horror begins to dawn upon her.

"How the hell do you fight anything underwater?!" Avira blurts out as she frantically pulls the Spine free. Swallowing, she's quick to regroup with Mercade, especially as the giant reveals itself. Normally she'd be super excited to fight this thing...but...

...being both underwater and beat up from yesterday didn't do much to help her confidence. But at the same time: "Did he just run away..?" she mutters, watching Jack flee like crazy. "He really did, didn't he. Well..."

In the meantime, she gives her newer haste spell a try, focusing it upon herself and a few others.

Zia has posed:
With her eyes already scanning for the source of the rumble, it isn't hard to pick up on Emi's sudden warning. This is just in time to watch a cricket go by, swimming on the back of a fish. Wait, what? Distractions. Luckily, Zia has gotten used to weird things happening over the past couple of months, so as long as strange cricket antics aren't alarming others, she doesn't pay it too much heed. Right, back to Emi's warning.

Wait, no, Deidra distracts her, too. "Ye know, gargoyles dinnae exactly have funerals." Maybe she'll go into the specifics about that some other time. Right now... well, best she doesn't have to deal with either sort.

And then the light from that orb is replaced by glowing red lights. Glowing red lights are never good. "Oh fer the love of..." Cutting herself off, the gargoyle steps back a bit, avoiding some falling rock in the process. This time, she uses her wings, backpeddling with them in order to get herself up and out of the way, hopefully avoiding those churning pincers.

She's mid-'flight' when the Aerith's magic takes hold, and she calls out a quick word of thanks towards her, nodding as she prepares her own magics. Unlike some others, Zia's magic has never really been aligned towards protection, only towards attack. Blame it on a certain dark mage who never saw fit to teach her such things.

Instead, she extends out one hand, building up a wall of ice around those claws in hopes that it might slow the creature down just slightly. If nothing else, it might buy them some time.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"Ooops. Captain Sparrow. Sorry." Mercade says to Jack, correcting himself. Politeness costs nothing. Mercade gapes at the sudden appearance of the horrifying Doom Lobster. Mercade flails himself backwards, trying to get some distance as he tries to keep the light on it. Rocks fly past him, propelled quickly even through the water and causing him to gasp in surprise as he takes cover. "WHY CAN'T THIS EVER BE EASY?" Mercade yells, pulling his gun.

"Where are you going to run, Captain? Do /you/ know how to get back to land?" Mercade points out.

Seymour Guado has posed:
Seymour would launch himself back to the group as the window of oppurtunity closed the rumbling closed in and they were faced with a mega crustacian.
He could only stare at the strange creature before selecting a small group to swim over to the group and begin selecting peope to assist in combat, smiling as he selected them and himself he closed his eyes and began waving his hands in a focused and controlled maner creating a strange bubble to form arond them.

Deidra has posed:
Deidra says "Right right..." She's not even thinking much about the water honestly it's just interesting being down here the information she's gathered. Then Emi hits the nail right on the head as it seems they got company a whole lot of combat wait no it's a huge thing beofre them and she stares her eyes going wide for the moment "Oh this is so not good!"

She's already preapring spells attemping to do what she cain against the huge creature and she thinks back to the wrecks and everything else they found what happened to them. So she's got her pad and she's starting to chant now even as JAck does his thing she can't argue with the sailor's actions but they got to press through it right? So there sh goes attemping to see if her magic works on this horror or not. For those who'd know Latin she's totally chanting in it at the moment.

Ping has posed:
Ping's eyes open wide and he spins in the water as the magical orbs rise up around, spinning and looking ominous. He's used to being completely in the dark and now he's literally in the dark as the huge, hulking shape of the mechanical crab looms overhead, casting its enormous shadow over him and the rest of the group. His hand shoots to his hip and he draws his sword with a flash.

Meanwhile, a certain cricket has lost control of his irate fish, the slippery creature speeding past Percival, Emi, and Ping before speeding off toward the giant crab, leading the charge. Instead of riding, the cricket is now holding on for dear life, clinging tightly to the dorsal fin and looking back toward those three with pleading eyes. Who's going to notice a pleading cricket, though. He'll just have to rely on luck.

Emi Dennou has posed:
"We are not Nipponaise', it is simply a name that we chose, The Network clarifies that they do not have nationality--" Why did they choose Japanese names? Probably Leida's fault. Also because their names were on the commissions. Woops.

Emi looks up at the Giant Enemy Lobster.

She looks over her shoulder towards Jack Sparrow.

And then back towards the lobster. There is a small pause--

And then she grabs Percival's arm and starts running after Jack, her arm reaching out for her GUN in the meanwhile, though it takes a moment. She loses some of her gold coins.

"Perhaps he means to lure it somewhere we can trap it, The Network looks for a convenient cave!" She got caught up in the RUN AWAY.

Percival has posed:
Oh, so she only ran him straight towards the giant runed crustacean with pinchers that could knock down buildings. Yep, it seems that once again Emi failed to steer him wrong.

Percival draws a runed blade from his scabbard with his left arm, and hooks his shield upon his right arm. He doesn't act immediately, instead sizing the creature up. A moment later, he's watching brave Sir Captain Sparrow bravely run away. As Emi attempts to run though, he unhooks himself from her. "Well drown buddy, this is where we part ways, just for a time. I'm afraid that under the circumstances, I'll be trying to drown 'before' Mercade. My apologies."

And with that, he kicks his way upwards, and positions himself level with the giant lobster. He doesn't advance at first, as if he were looking, and waiting for an opening.

Isaac Hanlon has posed:
Isaac does not appear to notice the horrible monster lobster at first. He figures something is up when Avira Hastes him, though. And also when the runes on the ruin walls start to glow and stuff. That's kind of big and obvious.

Isaac turns around. He stares up at the horrible monster lobster, mouth opening and closing a few times. He eventually shuts it, and calmly and casually closes down the translation app. It probably won't help him out that much in a huge fight. Instead, he takes a breath, and he... centers himself. Magic builds, but goes nowhere, which is kind of the idea.

Oblivion has posed:

Zeke's shots hit true, but hard to miss something this massive. After all, its head let alone was as long as one of the ships. It is no wonder there was so much wreckage down here. This mecha-lobster probably caused it all!

The bullets strike across the hard shell and bing into the surface as it skitters back slightly. The fire damage of the bullets attempt to melt into the mix of rocky metal surface, even as the runes on its body flicker and glow gently. Maybe trying to purge the infection?

However such attempts were halted as Tifa moved in and strikes it right in the head. The armor creaks slightly but doesn't seem to give so easily. At this close of range one can see that this thing was not just mechanic, no, it was some type of magitek construct. Some mix of rock, mixed with metal, mixed with magic, and things like wires are impossible to see. It-- almost seems organic in some ways too by how things moved.

The Ice then slams into the claws, freezing the water and those beastly claws in place for a moment. There was a creak, then a crack, before the beast shatters the ice from its claws and lets out a mighty screech in defiance of such an attack.

Suddenly the arcane spell shimmers around the Lobster monster, freezing it in place for a moment. Those runes cease glowing just for a sec before it breaks free from it. Four of those orb eyes turn to look at Deidra, before the other four do as well, then it fully turns to look at her. It didn't seem to like the effects of that spell much!

After all the attacks have come the massive Lobster machine suddenly rushes into the higher part of the water, sweeping over everyone as it does so, behind in its wake is a massive cyclone that attempts to rip everyone up with it in its wake, along with all that stuff laying around.

Then the massive creatures rushes through and attempts to slam them all caught in the cyclone. Trying to use its massive form to body rush them; That can't be good!

Aerith has posed:
The assault rams into Aerith, and yet the shimmering blue aura surrounding her absorbs most of the damage. Flowergirl grits her teeth in protest, but ends up not too worse for the wear. She does return the favor, after a few moments, first drawing in streams of spirit energy before channeling it toward one of her materia. The crystallized mako burned fiercely a split second before spikes of ice fire from the front end of her weapon.

Avira has posed:
What really shocks avira is to see ice magic...underwater. She didn't think such a thing would be possible, yet here here Zia is actually using it! Avira will admit that Zia is definitely a far superior and more experienced mage than her.

But the lobser-mecha doesn't allow further moments for deep contemplation about fighting underwater. It comes at them. It comes at all of them. Avira leap/swims up and manages to miss that first charge, though she doesn't come down and remains in the elevated location long enough to get blown by by the passage of the beast. Rather than let it go by completely, Avira grasps on to one of the panels with her free hand.

The other, weapon-baring, hand plunges the Spine down repeatedly. She tries to wedge the serrated blade between armor plates for maximum damage.

Percival has posed:
His patience, or perhaps just his reluctance, cost him. Swept up within the massive cyclone, Perci found himself struggling to maintain control. At first he was like a fish, swept up within a great current which battered him relentlessly as he attempted to swim against it.

But then the Gargoyle realized, he didn't have to swim against it. He let himself be swept up into it, as it drove him ever upwards, and just when the creature rushed him, he pushed forward, treating it like it was some sort of absurd jousting match, as he attempted to find purchase with the runed blade within its exoskeleton.

Once he had made his pass, the Gargoyle was suprised by a near collision with a cricket in distress, clinging onto a fish for dear life. While again it seemed like a mere hallucination, the poor creature seemed to be in dire straits, and the Gargoyle had a soft spot for that. His arm swept out, and he plucked the cricket off of the fish before it spun fully out of control. He then placed the cricket upon the edge of his scabbard, which seemed better shelter from the assault. He didn't know what material it was made of, but it always seemed to come out whole, even from attacks that by all rights, should have destroyed it utterly.

Zia has posed:
Already off the ground, it isn't hard for the passage of the giant lobstrosity to sweep Zia up in the cyclone. Rather than being slammed by the beast, though, she ends up forced against one of the stone pillars, the 'air' knocked out of her by the force of the impact. "Ow." The gargoyle coughs, sending up little airbubbles in the process. This whole breathing water thing is more than a little strange.

Pushing herself away from the rock, Zia turns, using her wings to push water away from her and get some distance between herself and those tall spires. Since trying to actually use electricity underwater could be troublesome, the girl instead tries some interesting combination magic. What looks to be ball lightning is surrounded by some sort of forcefield of shimmering purple energy, and this sphere of magic gets chucked towards the the beast as if Zia were launching a softball at high speed.

Plink.

Zeke has posed:
Zeke was battered about by the sudden vortex of water, tried firing into the void only to have a crab to the face. Defying all logic he stabbed at the thing's... Face? Was that it's face? While trying to climb onto the metal and stone beast. "I am Ezekiel Fawkes, captain of the Church's Ship Reliant and i will not be brought down by a brainless twit like you!" hIs voice growled and was probably inaudible over the rush and roar... and his own lungs making it come out more a wimper than a proclaimation. Still. He fired Everything he had. All the guns 'round his neck, the flintlocks at his side, and no telling how the musketoon got in there. He fired. All while the crab batted him away and out. Fair you well Captain. You proved an interesting speed bump.

Jack Sparrow has posed:

Jack gives Mercade a look best defined of 'yeah well /shut up/' in pure glance-based form, continuing his efforts to flee headlong away from the giant monster. "Yes, we'll go with that," he mutters as Emi theorizes on his actions. He runs, runs harder, runs as hard, in fact, as his gamy little legs can carry him, and yet he's going...

Nowhere.

When he's drawn upwards by the familiar feeling of a tide, Jack stops running for a moment, instead letting out a weary sigh before the giant enemy crustacean smashes beneath them. He is not struck directly, but the force of surging water presses him against a piece of ancient stonework, dragging him face-first along it with one eye held open and one hand firmly affixed to his hat. Jack seems to have escaped matters after this, other than floating in the water column above the creature afterwards.

"Hrm," he says to himself, before pivoting downwards, kicking his legs and drawing out his cutlass, moving behind the thing - towards the midsection, ideally away from where its tail is moving. "Thunder and bile," he murmurs dyspeptically, "is nothing ever easy?" He reverses the grip on his cutlass as he sees Zeke float past, and then aims to jam the trusty blade beneath a plate and pry it up.

He then reaches towards his other hip. Something isn't there, but he has not yet noticed its absence.

Seymour Guado has posed:
The Guado Maester was forced to rise with the strike by the huge monsterous lobster, he steadied himself high in the water as he raised his hands and began focusing himself to unleash some revenge on the creature.
With one fell swoop of his hand he would attempt to conjure lightning down upon the creatures back displaying some of his magical prowess.
"You will regret striking a Maester of Yevon.." he would speak to the creature staring with a glare.

Emi Dennou has posed:
Emi is not especially well suited towards fighting a giant enemy lobster under water. She can't even maneuver as well as she'd like. "If you'd like." She says, not begrudging his decision to fight a giant enemy lobster. If it was above water, she'd be quite happy to herself, especially with all that metal, but she has to admit she's now not so sure that Jack Sparrow had a plan after all.

A cricket passes by. Emi slows down to look at it. She is easily, as such, pulled into the cyclone, she rapidly spins about, getting even bashed by some pincers in the process, blood sprays from her head (or in certain versions, flowers!) and she struggles to recover, drawing out her rifle--really the best and only weapon she has for such circumstances--and opens fire, unleashing several quick bursts for the lobster.

"Isaac." She says. "I am concerned about controlling electricity within impure fluids, do you have any ideas?, The Network inquires." This is not a situation she ever had to deal with before--considering she avoided water like the plague.

Ping has posed:
The cyclone stirs up the water, but not Ping. The peace of the Ancestors is with him and he looks inward with his mind's eye and thinks, "I will bend like a reed in the wind." The water surges but Ping's body moves gracefully, spinning like a leaf descending gently to the earth. Even the sudden assault of the lobstrosity fails to find purchase on his flotsam body.

Pirouetting out of the whirling waters, Ping lashes out with his sword, striking at the rocky, metallic body of the mammoth creature. His spin slows, but his blade dances like a candle's flickering flame.

His bearings return to him as well and he notes the positions of his allies around him, Emi, Percival, Tifa, Mercade, and the others, witnessing the violence this creature perpetrates on his comrades.

What Ping doesn't witness, is the ongoing adventures of a cricket twenty leagues beneath the sea. That cricket's in a very tiny and subtle state of alarm, his fish caught in the same swirl as Percival. Yet, the heroic giant notices the tiny bug and in an expression of compassion that proves the nobility of gargoyle kind, he saves the little bug. The cricket quickly rushes into the relative safety of Percival's scabbard though he soon peeks his little head out to watch the proceedings.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"OH GOD ITS USING SPLASH ATTACKS!" Mercade yells, as the water begins rushing around, trying to snatch him up. He stuffs the flashlight under his arm as he grabs onto the wall, using it to anchor himself. Avira is pulled past him, and he reflexively tries to grab for her. "AVIRA!"

He let go of the wall to do that. In desperation, he grabs onto the wall with his legs, skidding slowly towards losing a grip on it. "ISAAC!" Mercade yells. "DO YOU SEE A WEAK SPOT ANYWHERE?" He uses his gun anyway, trying to shoot boolet at the giant enemy lobster.

Isaac Hanlon has posed:
Isaac goes for a swim. Whee! He gets sucked up in the wake of the horrible lobster monster, thrown around and battered by rubble. It sucks, truly it does, but it is hardly life-threatening. Maybe...

"Do you have anything solid and conductive?" Isaac asks, looking over at Emi for a second. He swims a ways back from the lobster monster, lobbing an arcane bolt up at it to weaken its defenses and then following it up with a greater volley. He's going for rate of fire rather than killing power, probing for weaknesses. "Weak points? Let me think -- uh, I could have sworn I read something about giant lobster constructs a few months ago, or may be it was giant /crabs/? Uhh -- one minute!!"

Pew pew pew!!

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart doesn't know if it has a weak point or not at this point, but the hurricanes and changing for currents aren't helping the cause at the moment either! "If its mechanical, it must have a power core of some kind, don't you think?" She doesn't think it needs eyes though, so she won't try for that. But what she can do is try to crack that armor some.

She swims upward, and turns around as she finds a rocky ledge, flipping on herself, and populsing herself downward, straight at it, aiming to bodyslam and break the armor where it seems the weakest, around the tail. It has many scales to allow it to move, so it must be weaker than the body itself. Worth a try anyway.

Deidra has posed:
Things be going crazy at this point the thing has just ripped the hell out of her and there goes Zeke she ginges but well there's nothing she can do against that thing and help him at the same time and there's far too many left. It's own attack is met by her just swimming fast as she can and a barrier spell which keeps her from harm but gives out with the impac.t She follow up her spell work rom before with an chain of ice spell sening torpedo like ice bolts at the hulking thing.

Oblivion has posed:

As Aerith conjures her own spell, the ice magic slams into the massive construct, but not before he sends out a blast wave of percussion in the water to knock her higher up into the waters. The Ice slams into his frame, where it actually lets out a screech, yet it seems to shake it off with an annoying odd sound that could remind one of gears grinding and crackling.

Then Percival moved into Melee range of the mighty sea monster. The Creature then lashed out one of its smaller claws before not in time to move the gargoyle away before he blame could jab into one of those massive lens, causing it to short out for a moment.

Which then it shakes its head a few times trying to 'reboot' pehaps the damage done!

Avira takes a free ride on the mecha creature and she starts to slam the blade into what seems like a nice weak point. How right she is! The creature nearly archs as it swims around. Trying to be rid of the pest that is poking away at it with a sharp pointy thing. At one point it even does an underwater barrel roll!

Suddenly electric ball and electricity! The magic Zia sends out slams into the monsters metallic and stone shell. The surge rushes around it, and Seymour's own doesn't help with this effect. It screeches in metallic pain, before it suddenly starts to sink toward the ground for a moment, as the lights fade from it, leaving it open for the rush of attacks that come forth.

Jack's sword slashes into the massive tail. His blade sharp and deadly, striking at the beast while it was out for the count. Each strike cutting into the heavy metal. Yet it would take a great deal of time to chop off the beast's tail as it was indeed a large tail to be chopped! However perhaps this could at least maybe slow the beasty down?

Emi's shot impacts hard into the bottom side of the creature. Parts of stone and metal are flung off into the depths of the sand below. The same goes for Mercade and Isaac as their combined attacks start to penetrate the creature's armor. Bit by bit.

Like Jack, it would seem Ping too has taken advantage of the downed creature. The blade slashing away at the heavy armor, slashing it the stone and metal. Marking up its mighty structure with blades pealing in deep.

Tifa seems to aim for the other side of where Jack is going to town. Her fist impacts the massive armored tail and she pounds away at it. The plates starting to slowly give to the combine damage, yet it would seem that it wasn't enough time.

The glow of the lobster monster activates once more, before it screeches loudly and suddenly dives down low rapidly. However here comes the brave Capitan Zeke in attempt to make the creature pay for its actions. The 'mindless' beast doesn't seem to care to be called that and charges right at the dear captain. The claws striking out with range and anger as Zeke moves nimbly around the strikes, yet it would seem some kinda barrier was brought up in its rage. The very barrier starting to engulf the lobster, before it slams at last one of its massive claws into Zeke to send the brave captain far into the depths of the ocean. There was a twinkle of bright light then; perhaps the very magic that brought him here also swept him away?

However suddenly the damage done by the many starts to try to regenerate as the beast comes to land on the sound ground and move back a bit. Its claws clipping from time to time, as it the runes glow brighter. However what it was once more attempting to repair, is interrupted yet again by blizzard magic thanks to Deidra. The creature doesn't seem overly happen with its status right now and soon rushes right back into the high parts of the water, before attempting to lash out at everyone in its passing with its massive claws.

Zia has posed:
Alas, with her combat training really still at a fledgling stage, Zia still has trouble focusing on more than one thing while fighting. The first thing she latches on to is Issac's comment about weak points. "Well, maybe if ye have some kind'o giant lobster cracker." It's not a great suggestion, but... if it were an actual living creature, it might make one hell of a good lobster bisque. She doesn't manage to hold that thought for very long, though.

Especially as the creature's claw comes out towards her faster than the gargoyle is able to avoid it. It snags on one of her wings, catching it and using the force of it to toss her out further into the water. Wincing, Zia rolls end over end before righting herself at last, hand moving to clutch at her injured wing. Her eyes flash red, but then she just tucks her wing, It's going to take her a moment to get back into the fight completely, but maybe she can at least cause it some more of an annoyance while she swims back towards the others.

One-handed, she chucks another ball of that strangely purple-coated lightning. However it is she's doing that, it at least keeps the electricity from leeching elsewhere into the water.

Aerith has posed:
Right, this was not looking good. Aerith tried to move out of the way, and yet still got knocked aside by the backwash from the attack. Her shield held up... for the moment. But it wouldn't last long. Maybe it was time to do something a bit more defensive, and her first order of business was... well, healing.

Motes of pale green light encircled her as the magics went to work, and she focused the rest of her energy on two others.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart doesn't like claws! That's the first thing that goes when she cooks lobster. She wouldn't want those things to cut her, but when they are about twice as big as she is, that's never a good thing either! She swims back toward Aerith, taking a bit of a defensive stances as she decidess to buff herself and her friend up for safety "This thing is annoying, but I think the tail is starting to give out."

Jack Sparrow has posed:

Jack frowns as he finds himself stabbing into meat without end. In some situations the presence of a giant fish would be pleasant. Why, he could stick chunks on a skewer and put them over a fire and make quite a meal out of it. A meal that would be washed down with...

With...

His hand clutches at his side before the monster moves. He feels the ripples of Tifa's fury into the side of the thing. He says, "Excuse me, excuse me, my dear, gorgeous maiden, could you perhaps tell me, if it's not terribly too much trouble, where -"

And then it glows. Jack is momentarily distracted by that shimmering glow, before the barrier washes upwards, knocking him loose, sending him floating. He sees something of the right size, and grabs at it, and wonder of wonders, so it is. Holding the green glass bottle, Jack Sparrow is at peace.

Then the creature smashes it with the tip of one titan claw, and Jack looks agonized, anguished, beyond consolation or mercy when the glass shatters, fragments of green glass and a dark cloud swirling in the thing's wake, drawn forever and anon away from his grasp.

He looks upwards. His face becomes set, fearful and grim, as he sees the thing rise. He sinks downwards - to kick off the ground, howling as he makes a torpedo of his own body, cutlass first, "WHY!? WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT!! GAHHHH--"

Percival has posed:
Probably much to his lucky little passenger's chagrin, the Gargoyle held his ground as he saw giant crab coming straight at him.

It may have looked positively suicidal, but he wasn't even attempting to dodge its attack. Instead, he just appeared to be intensely focused upon his next offensive.

Gripping the runed blade runed blade at a high guard with both hands, he waited until the Crustacean was only a short distance away. As it lashed forward, he struck, and used the momentum to reverse his position and posture. While the impaling claws did manage to gouge away a good chunk of his flesh, it was nothing vital. His own movements allowed him to flow from the first strike into a thrust as the Gargoyle stuck the blade within a perceived gap in its exoskeleton, allowing the crab's own advance to do the rest. Whether it finds purchase or not, the Gargoyle would then finally, attempt to kick off of the crustacean, downwards and away before it could get in a second attack.


Poor cricket. It was likely either hyperventilating or fainted dead away from fright by now. Perci didn't have time to look.

Seymour Guado has posed:
Seymour was hit and hit hard by that attack sent through the water, looking around as others faced the same problem, deciding to assist more than go on the offensive he began waving his fingers through the air gathering his white magics. Selecting his targets he would wave his hand down at them and then finally himself to engulf them in a healing light.
"This thing is powerful... But not strong enough I fear.." he stares at it with slight pity knowing its pain from battle would end soon enough, judging from everyone else's powers he atleast speculated as much and hoped afterall this thing must be guarding something important.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade just keeps on Mercading, keeping his distance as much as he can. With sich a massive beast, even with a native terrain bonus, it can still only move so fast. Mercade is sent flying back, sent smashing into a underwater wall. He grunts in pain, and grabs on the new wall as he brings up the gun. "ISAAC!" Mercade yells. "YOU NEED TO TRAIN YOUR PIG TO FIND US BETTER MAPS!" He yells, continuing to spam the Gun commannd at the Guardian.

Emi Dennou has posed:
"Mm... There is a knife but that would require getting uncomfortably close..." Emi doesn't want to try doing it through the gun because that seems like an even foolisher(ed) idea. She notices Zia doesn't seem to be having any trouble, perhaps Zia can teach her how that works later. For the moment, though, she'll have to make do. She fires a quick spray from her rifle towards the crab as it approaches before strapping it against her back once more and ducking down, making her body small as the claw comes by. She's only really gonna get one proper shot at this, after all.

The pincer arm flashes for her. She pushes suddenly to the right, the claw not even slicing her cheek as it fles past her. She can't swim, so she lashes out quickly, stabbing the knife into one of the armored claw's segments, intent on digging it in there...

...and going along for the ride!

"Nghh!!" Emi says as she's shaken up and down, her body wobbling rapidly as she tries to focus despite all the shaking about.

"Channeling." Emi says.

She grips the blade with one hand and unleashes a very unimpressive looking burst of electricity through the knife. But the thing about electricity is that it's not really how it looks so much as how much voltage is running through the body. She doubts there's much electrical resistance in this crab.

She waves an arm hello to Ping as she dangles precariously.

Ping has posed:
The strike of the creature's claws is always preceded by a surge of water, a wave that catches Ping's lithe body and buffets him away before the strike can land. He is like the seed of a dandelion spinning through the air on the back of a gentle wind. He'd never describe himself as dandelion, though. He'd be a much tougher plant, like a... tree of some kind, a sycamore, perhaps.

Such biological metaphors are far from his mind as he lashes out, again and again, against this steely hide. It is quickly appearant, however, that he's not making much headway. He looks up, into the melee, to search for Emi. She's always got a clever plan, but he catches sight of her just as she receives a brutal head wound. Gosh, that girl bleeds a lot of blood.

Things do not seem to be going well but instead of letting fear take hold of his heart, he loses his eyes and summons the peace and clarity he requires to win the day.

"Ancestors... I know you can hear me."

Three glowing green spheres of energy emerge from Pings body and orbit him in a quick circle. Above, a black cloud appears in a churning swirl of water. In the inky depths of that black swirl, the sinuous body of some denizen of the deep can be seen writhing. The green orbs of light vanish just as a red lizard bursts through the black cloud, racing like an arrow towards Ping.

The little lizard calls out, "I think a squid just pooted on me, Ping! That thing thinks I'm a rice noodle! Who ever heard of a red rice noodle!?"

A squid bursts through the black cloud after the tiny lizard, intent on eating him. The lizard shoots through the water and disappears into a fond in Ping's armor. Ping's eyes go wide as the squid crashes directly into his face, sending him tumbling like a meteor toward the lobstrosity's body. Scout, squid, and serpent have all become one clumsy projectile.

Still, he manages to wave back to Emi.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade gets smacked with a claw in retaliation. Mercade grumbles. "I must be getting delerious, I could swear I hear Eddie Murphy."

Deidra has posed:
Deidra has to say the stranger they picked up has been interesting at the very least he's been pretty good at helping. Mr. Sparrow is strange in a fight but well? he's managed to surive this far? Oh look more sea crab thing and this time her barriers are not able to do so much. Still she's got a plan and she's building up to something it looks like but the ice forms gain this time bigger larger and she just forms it into a single massive ice lance which she launches at the ceature trying to impale it. But the claws they are taking their toll upon her she's clearly hurt but it could be far worse.

Isaac Hanlon has posed:
Pew pew. Chip. Pew pew. Chip.

Okay. Not working so well.

Isaac gets tossed around like a ragdoll, horrible claws smashing him around and basically making life a living hell. He drifts for a bit in the water, wishing that he could not feel all the pain in his everything. The burns on his legs are particularly prominent. Stupid eye lasers. He needs to learn how to do that.

Isaac substitutes the eye part with extra laser. He basically just points at the giant monster and fires an impressively large blue cutting beam at it. It makes a fairly distinct sort of noise when he does it.

He's not so good at eye lasers, but he can do SFX.

Avira has posed:
Under any other circumstance, this would be quite fun! Avira remains clinging to the mechanical leviathan, though only for a little while before she is flung free of the beast. When this happens, she goes flying through the water uncontrollably, smashing into the remains of one of the ancient walls down here.

Groaning, it takes her a little longer than before to pick herself back up, her muscles starting to ache as yesterday's exertion combines with today's pain. A large part of her regrets joining Mercade and the others this moment for this adventure.

The rest of her is inspired by Deidra, tirelessly unleashing her ice magic just as Zia did. Underwater. Using the Spine as a focus, Avira follows suit, spending all of her concentration on weaving together an ice spell of specific shape. The snarling beasts called together are no doubt familiar to those who have fought her recently.

Underwater, they move far more slowly. Avira's face is creased in concentration as she commands her magic, the exertion painfully obvious. With her remaining bit of energy, she "joins" her creations against the mechanical leviathan, slamming herself into it, Spine-point first.

Oblivion has posed:

Zia's lightning attack moves in once more. The Massive Lightning ball again attempts to knock out the creature, yet the massive beast this time seems to quickly regain, swimming back up before it is fully brought back down below. Thankfully it seems the creature swims wide of Zia, by how it moves, it was indeed 'in pain'.

Was this mechanize monster actually alive?

It also seems the mechanic lobster has angered Captian Jack Sparrow by perhaps destroy a flask of rum. There is one thing you must always remember children, never touch a pirates rum! Bad things happen when you touch his rum. Point and case here!

The Pirate moves in with great speed as the mechanic monster moves around and attempts to sweep up Jack, yet the pirate prevails and slams his blade into the massive creature's side, ripping one of the panels nearly right off the hinge.

Percival though uses the massive creature size and speed against him. The Gargoyle uses that blade of his to carve right into the beast. His sword enters right into the spot that Jack Sparrow opened and digs in deep. The Creature actually lets out a hissing scream in pain, quickly blasting away from the impact point, wildly tossing out its claws at nothing but water. Though no fluid was lost, something must have been struck to cause such great pain!

Or he hit something that caused a momentary short circuit.

This leaves the creature wide open for Mercade's bullets to impact the armor, more of the armor panels start to blasted off from the continue damage, the rocky surface being chipped away as magic runes start to spark out magic. However in its wild flail, it swings one of its massive claws right for Mercade, before spinning right around. Though spin around is suddenly ceases as Emi's channeling of electricity slams through the Ancient mechanical lobster. It swings the claw trying to free the trouble maker from its armor, snapping one of its own panels off the claw in order to be rid of her!

Suddenly there was a squid, a Chinese soldier, and a lizard! That all went rushing right for the mechanical ancient guardian left to these ruins. The massive beast was slammed into with such force that it actually sent it back. The beast tumbled in the waters. It would seem size matters not when you have the will of the ancestors behind you.

It takes a moment for the creature to correct itself. The tail was actually starting to spark an odd blue glow as it tried to correct. The damage starting to officially take its toll back there.

The ice attack then takes advantage of the weaken state of the creature. The ice forms around the massive construct. Freezing the entire body of the beast, encasing it with ice in every crevice and location it could spread too. Slowly the beast starts to sink once more, but the ice begins to creak at locations.

Isaac then unleashes the laser of DEATH. The things slams into the frozen form of the sea monster, slashing into it with high power. The laser beams does indeed cut in deep, striking against the rocky metal surface, thawing the icy surface and sparks of light flash out from the Guardian Leviathan. That beam does the number alright and though the Monster attempts to break free, the damage done is to great by everyone here and the Isaac beam of communications.

However it still moves, its still trying to break from from its ice prison. It wont be long now and Avira takes her chance. Her blade slams into the creature. Impaling it right where Isaac cut it deep. The female adventurer seems to vanish within it as the creature actually bends over. This massive beast, bending over as gears screech and metallic hissing is heard. The sounds of pain and agony breaking across loudly. Its body shudders, the claws starting to freeze in place. The runes flashing brightly.

The red optical eyes starting to dim and then flash back to life. It shudders again, yet no Avira.

Soon though Avira breaks free from the other side, shoved out with her a shard; more correctly the water shard. After she breaks out the Guardian lets out another screech in pain as the body starts to glow brightly. Blue lines rush along its body. Blue magical energy spills out from all the cracks and slashes made into its armor.

The glow becomes bright and then suddenly the attire creatures starts to implode upon itself, as the light moves inward, then it explodes with brilliant light as parts and pieces go flying out.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"Wow." Mercade says. "Remind me to bring Avira along for the next time we have uppity crustaceans on hand." He asides. Gingerly, he waits for the surrounding water to clear up, and he squints at Avira. "W... What are you holding, Avira?" He asks.

Emi Dennou has posed:
Emi swoops through the water before sinking again. She waggles her arms but still continues to not be able to swim.

:(

Zia has posed:
As she swims back towards the fight, there is a glow in the water around her, which dulls most of the pain in her wing. It's easy enough to tell where the magic comes from, and Zia swims over to hover just a bit above Aerith, "Ye know, lass, Ah'm gointe owe ye a drink after all this. Or at least a good meal." Never let it be said that Zia doesn't appreciate healers. "We'll beat this overgrown entre yet." Why is it always food? Maybe she hasn't eaten recently, who knows.

Of course, this is all said before the others have a chance to start laying into the beast. In the end, though, it's Isaac's giant blue laser of doom and Avira's icey death. "Nicely done!" She calls out, raising her hand up in the air in a completely unnecessary show of victory. There is a moment when she might worry for Avira's sake, but then she's back, and whatever exclaimation of approval she might have said gets turned quickly into one that cannot be shown here because it might scar the minds of children.

That said, Zia hits the deck as the lobstrosity explodes, only peeking up after things seem to have cleared. Then, she's off to investigate what Avira managed to snag from the monster.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Well then, Tifa's buffs didn't do much! But as long as its defeated, that's fine with her. When the mechanical being explodes, she quickly latches on to Aerith, pulling her away and shielding her a bit using herself. She's a bit tougher than the flower girl, even if she toughened up quite a bit since they first met. She wouldn't let a friend get in the way if she can help it though... and she can only shield one friend at a time, sadly.

She phews though, as it only did superficial damage overall "That could have been alot worse... but now what?" She looks over the others surrounding were the crab used to be. "Was that what the map was pointing us at you think?

Ping has posed:
Dizzy and adrift, Ping is wearing a squid for a hat. He looks up and the squid looks down at him, both of them sharing a look of bewilderment. On top of the squid's bulbous head, a small lizard can be seen posing triumphantly.

The lizard speaks dismissively of the ruined lobstrosity, "Ancient Guardian Leviathan? Hah. There's only one Guardian around here and that's me. He's not going to forget that any time soon." The lizard claps his hands, dusting them off like it were a job well done.

Meanwhile, an equally dizzy cricket peeks its tiny bug head up out of Percival's scabbard. It looks around and sees that the chaos seems to have passed. It lifts a tiny arm and wipes its antenna with a silent 'whew.'

Emi Dennou has posed:
"Zia," Emi asks as she sinks. "How did you do that electrical purple orb?"

She continues waggling her arms up and down nonchalantly.

Percival has posed:
Perci actually moves in towards the explosion in order to try and reach Emi, to try and retrieve her from a wild ride that even Ferris Bueller himself might have envied. While he wasn't a fast swimmer, she wasn't so fast of a sinker either that he couldn't reach her. Not that it made any difference, given that he couldn't really slow her descent either, which he realized upon reaching her. Even so, he goes along for the sinking trip. "Well drowning-buddy. Neither Mercade nor I happened to drown. You could still try to aim for the gold coins though if it suits you."

Percival actually makes a move to resheathe his sword, but then thankfully remembers, at the last second that there is in fact a cricket in there; thus sparing the cricket once again.

Aerith has posed:
Aerith sighed and shut her eyes, the materia returning to their dormant state once again. Okay, that was a bit of rough sailing, but they made it. Tifa did have a point though. What should they do now? Clearly that little bouncing ball of light as someone called it, was leading them somewhere. The question was, where was it headed, and would it come back?

Avira has posed:
Originally the plan had been to just strike it. Avira had thought her size and momentum meant she'd just bounce off the armor like a ping-pong ball bounces off a hard surface. It's an additional surprise to her to find herself plunging through the mechanical belly of the beast but she's quick to adapt to the situation. Within, she is surrounded by the impressive inner workings of the leviathan, all tied together around a power source that-

No, she knew what that was. A part of her screamed that she knew exactly what it was. This realization is enough to drive her through, seizing the blue glow and emerging from the other side.

She swims herself away frantically, pushed back further by the explosion. When she finally comes to a stop, she holds the shard out to Zia and Mercade.

"I'm...pretty sure it's a part of Manhattan." she says tiredly, letting herself sink, upside-down, to the sea floor.

Seymour Guado has posed:
The Guado sank to the sea floor sighing in minor relief the strange machina lobster was beaten, his blue eyes scanning the others asking "Anyone badly injured?"

His voice calm and gentle as he looked to see if he was needed to assist them in any other way, trying to be a helpful maester to all wether or not they chose to use Machina or not. Ther assistance had been most useful and without them this fight would have been greatly troubling, fortunately it seemed to turn out to be a sucessful win.

Zia has posed:
The white gargoyle blinks, ears tucking back. "Uh. Ah'll show ye later, lass." Zia deflects the question for now. Some things are best not discussed in front of a whole group of people who just took down a giant guardian beast. "Promise." She does take a few steps closer across the sea-floor to get a look at this particular part of Manhattan. She'd seen some of the others, but somehow it's still a curious thing.

Jack Sparrow has posed:

Recoiling back from the giant crab-beast, Jack has time to consider his errors in life. (And look momentarily towards a passing dragon. Strange, he thinks: it's speaking?) His teeth set, he raises his cutlass, and then -

A woman smashes through the thing. Seizing a strange shard of light, and then passing past, as the creature begins imploding. "Aye," Jack tells the creature in a low voice, perhaps of commisseration, "Man or mollusk, it's women that so often prove our downfall."

"Yours anyway," he concludes, sheathing his cutlass in his belt and dog-paddling over towards where Mercade, the putative expedition leader, is loitering. Along with the dragon.

Jack seems to be squinting at the little red lizard intently, as if trying to discern its reality. He also calls up to Emi, "Move your arms like you're pushing, you'll get your sea-legs afore long." Then towards Mercade again. "So the immense creature which you and your valiant band of witches and warlocks have slain; that would be the legitimate owner of all of what can be found here, then?"

Emi Dennou has posed:
Emi nods to Zia, and tries to do as Jack Sparrow suggested and ends up actually more clobbering Percival in the face.

"Ah! Sorry, The Network says, going back to sinking. "The Network is glad everyone is alright. This one was not especially well suited for this situation."

She looks on over to Avira and nods, "We should search anyway, in case we find the shard."

Or more gold. hi there. More end up in her pockets. She's got a family of six to feed, mistahs, please be generous, sahs.

Isaac Hanlon has posed:
Isaac spends a couple moments nursing bruises, suddenly adding dozens of new ones from the exploding rock lobster. He is not terribly pleased by it.

Then he starts to gather up loot, making judicious use of gravity-altering magic and very rough barriers to form a box for it. You never know, man.

Ping has posed:
Seeing that he's been spotted, the tiny lizard on Ping's head dashes beneath the squid and uses his arms to articular the dizzy creature's appendages.

"Just and octopus, don't mind me, nope, nope." the creature says before tumbling off Ping's head and drifting away with the currents.

A small cricket vacates Percival's sheath before bowing politely to him. It paddles quickly over to Ping and finds refuge in a small wooden cage at his hip, closing the door behind him. Safe in his refuge, it waves back to the gargoyle in thanks.

Ping just listens to the goings on around him, happy that no-one's teasing him about his Ultimate Attack.

Isaac Hanlon has posed:
Isaac also checks the map, because maybe that is how they get out before they start drowning.

He has not forgotten!!

Percival has posed:
And so Perci gets clobbered in the face. It probably wouldn't have done much damage except for the fact that he'd been swimming towards her at the time. Ow. While he's rubbing his nose, he watches the Cricket bow to him? Maybe he was hit harder than he thought, until he sees it return to Ping. Ah. Maybe its a trained pet? That would explain a few things.

It was comforting to know that he hadn't lost his mind.

Oblivion has posed:

As Isaac looks at the map, it starts to glow mystic energy once more. The lights around the area start to flicker out one by one. Things slowly start to get darker and darker.

Soon all the light goes out beyond what light the individuals can cast and the glow of the map. Then suddenly with a brilliant light, everyone who arrived here is suddenly rushed upward by the magical weave of light. It moves around, circles them and transports them straight out. Once more the sense of flying takes over, actual air returns to them, before they find themselves yet again falling.

Falling and falling, before suddenly they are on land yet again, at at the very locations they were pulled away from. Each one dry with no signs of water on them. As if they had never left the place, yet time had passed and in Avira's hands still remained the stone.

Jack Sparrow has posed:

"Excuse me, my good man!" Jack says as he floats towards Isaac as he starts using his fell and probably-Satanic sorceries to sweep together the gold. In fact, he slides upwards, close enough to give him a hearty pat on the back and stay there, a sodden and poorly hygenic presence as he says, looking at the heaps of glittering plunder, "Amazing, isn't it?"

"Now then," he continues, "I do not mean to derogate, nor deride your nautical cunning but I think it would be fair to say that in all likelihood you've not had a ton of experience as men - and ladies," this with a brief glance towards (randomly chosen) Aerith, and a tip of the hat, "of fortune. The distribution of wealth is a matter of supreme importance in my line of work, so if I may, I would like to propose a certain degree of precision, of regularity in our disposition of our gains."

He breathes in some water, getting kind of used to this really. "Now the usual thing is for the treasure to first be divided into shares, but we must first consider what those shares are!" A finger is raised. "Naturally we must consider matters such as surgeon's attention, which is paid for to hurts proportionate, and then we divide by share and share alike, with only officers receiving an extra share in proportion. You, for instance, deserve two shares, for finding this most excellent map; your friend Mr. Alexander in turn, the same, and as for myself, as an advisor and as a counselor I will, of course, be pleased to accept the burthen of a larger proportion myself."

He takes in another breath. "And of course, given my own efforts in the fray, I would s- It's glowing," Jack says, before he /dives/ onto the treasure, desperately attempting to hug as much of it to himself as is reasonably possible before death ensues.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade looks over at the Shard, blinking. "Why... Why was it in that /thing/?" Mercade asks. He looks over at some of the rubble-like shards of the mechanical lobster of death. "Could this have been some kind of trap? Manhattan's only been gone for..." He pauses, thinking as he floats there.

Jack makes a good question. He looks over to the Captain, considering his question. "I don't think we have much time left. We need the Shard, but take what you can before we leave, go for it. You certainly earned it."

Mercade does pick up a single gold coin. A memento...

And then they're sent flying back to dry land. "Wow." Mercade says. "What a trip."

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart looks over to Avira after being 'deported' like that. Well, so much for treasure hunting AFTER the baddie is defeated. But at lesat they got the shard, if its really one. She looks over to Mercade, nodding "So many odd worlds out there. I wonder what else is waiting in the next one now."

Jack Sparrow has posed:

Jack opens one eye after the sea is replaced by land, laying now, spread-eagle, atop a heap of gold and miscellaneous treasure.

He spits out water for about ten seconds, takes off his hat and dumps the water out of it as he sits up, and replaces it on his head. After a deep breath, he declares, "Now as I was saying:"

Isaac Hanlon has posed:
Isaac looks to Jack. "I was actually going to suggest something like that. We'll just meet in the bar, and divvy it up equally so nobody gets left --"

Everything falls away. Isaac gets sucked into ANOTHER DIMENSION well okay the first dimension he came from in the first place. Things spin, and he stumbles -- and then solidifies, back to the meeting point where they came in in the first place.

" -- out," he finishes. "I don't think this is something to be discussed on empty stomachs."

Zeke has posed:
Zeke is busy stting on a barrel or five of Rum. Where'd they come from? Especially given he's an honest trader? Who knows! Anyway he's drinking from a large tankard and staring at people as they come poofing back into this end of reality. "Apologies for leavin as i did. Most undignified. Anyone Thirsty?"

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"I agree. Let's haul this stuff back to Cloud Nine. Everyone can get something to eat and drink and we can celebrate a job well done. You guys were amazing, all of you." Mercade grins.

He asides, "We have lots of rum there."

Jack Sparrow has posed:

"Yes," says WHO DO YOU THINK even as he stands up and walks off the treasure. His boots jingle slightly, but that's probably just from walking on a heap of gold, which he does seem surprisingly adept at doing.

Seymour Guado has posed:
Seymour was caught in the strange light appearing back aboard his boat with the other two guardians, his eyes looking out to the ocean smiling as he remembered seeing what the majority were after "Strange so many seek these little shards... But it has peaked my interest... I might aquire one perhaps and see what all the fuss is about."

Looking to the other crew member saying "Yevon thanks you for your Patronage, we will be setting sale from here, there is much to be done."

Presenting the prayer of Yevon a slightly devious grin now playing on the face of the Maester a plan forming perhaps or simply glad things worked out so well, whatever the reason he was smiling.

Emi Dennou has posed:
Emi is relieved once it becomes apparent they will not die one of the worst possible time. "This one apologizes again." She says, embarrassed, to Percival. Nevertheless, once she's settled and regains her composure, she nods to Jack Sparrow.

"If you'd like, this one has no objections." Even to the 'advisor share'? Well, Emi's greed may be greed but she's happy enough that she has gold at all. She expected it to vanish when they reappeared and she's had a remarkable string of good fortune as of late. Fluorgis cash pinata, and so on. Hopefully the treasure isn't cursed, though.

Ping has posed:
Ping is sitting on the ground after getting wooshed back through the whirlpool and back onto dry land. He rubs his forehead and watches as important matters such as shares and accounting are discussed. He marvels at just how blase these people are about travelling between worlds.

"Maybe it's like the water... I just need to get my Sliding-legs," he muses about magical portals to other worlds.

Deidra has posed:
Deidra can only stare in suprise for half a second at this monster she's not sure what to think about it. She wonder was it a living machine? Or some sort of cyborg? She's not sure what to think but she does however pull her pad open and start to get the things final moments damn. That might be something for later however it is Avira whose the hero of the hour and Isaac has done quite a bit as well lasers? She needs to ask him about that one later. For now she's content that it isn't it? The whirlpool and away they go back to land the Gartyoll is flat on her face but all things considered she gives a thumbs up she's fine really she is!

Percival has posed:
Land! Beautiful, natural, non-drowny land! It wasn't quite the open sky but he'd take it! Righting himself on his feet, he smiled at Emi. "There's no need to apologize. It was an accident, Emi I know that. Any aches and pains will mend with the coming dawn."

Breathing in, he closes his eyes for a moment to give silent thanks through prayer, before he opens them again and looks straight ahead. "Emi, if its not too much trouble, could you see that my share finds it way to Max? I have no desire for any of it."

Isaac Hanlon has posed:
"I need a potion and a drink, not necessarily in that order," Isaac says. "Let's get this somewhere I can put it down and we can get to counting and splitting it." He nods at the substantial hovering pile of treasure, dimly outlined in blue. There's a little flickering tether attached to his right hand, and one from his right to the tablet in his left.

Emi Dennou has posed:
"If that is your wish." Emi says. "Though for negotiations, one should be careful of what one says." That Sparrow seems to be shrewd when glittery things come into the picture.

Zeke has posed:
Zeke looked around slightly disappointed but quickly took a drink from his mug to cover. After all these people endured God knows what just now. That they were all tired and not in any sort of party or festivities mood should be understandable. He shrugged and continued drinking. Maybe a few would stick around. After all he brought rum, and these 'finger' foods should be on the way.