The trio act quickly, first the drones go ablazing, relentlessly slamming into the creature with a vengeance. Sleel, seeing that the creature is distracted tears into action, her hand launching at the creature, grappling its wrist. She braces herself as the creature looks down at the hand holding it. Its blades held high, it seems that the attacks of the drone have no effect at all on the menacing creature, but it stands there nonetheless, doing nothing as you assault it with your most powerful attacks. If anything, it seems to smile, standing there savoring something sweet. An anger, a vile hatred of the creature wells up inside of you, the fact that your attacks are seemingly useless makes you hate the creature even more, a bottled rage overtakes your sense of reason, and the creature opens its arms, embracing the hate, feeding off of it.

Jack fell flat on the ground, going absolutely still as the shadows surged around, over, and past him. He tried to become one with the rock, to be a quiet little mouse that no one would notice.

It worked at first, the shadows swarming past him. Tevos was doing something magic, and whatever it was almost took him off his feet. Then he saw Rebo's aural form being dragged into visibility by the shadows. They seemed to be trying to tear him apart. And then craters started exploding out of the rock, showering him with rock chips, more shadows swarming around something that he couldn't see.

Dogma screams and throws himself into the the midst of the shadows, attempting to make an opening for Rebo. Seeing the boss literally leap into action broke Jack's paralysis. Spirits, he knew all about fighting spirits, and he wasn't about to let more friends fall before them. He pushed himself up and activated his shock gloves, moving in to cover Dogma's flank as they attempted to carve a hole through the fluttering darkness.
-------------------------------------------------

"Dammit! We can't win this a straight-up fight with these things!" Rebo yells. "Alright, it's big gun time!"

Concentrating harder than he ever has before, Rebo turns towards the mutating mountain spirit, places his hands out in front of him, palms facing outwards, one overlapping the other like some old anime character firing an energy blast, and speaks with a shouting voice that has all his confidence behind it.

"By the power of my mind, you are expelled from this world, your energies scattered, your form shattered, never to be reformed! BEGONE!"

Tevos saw his world spin. Feeling like he was just hit with a small Buick, but knowing that the massive spirit was doing its job to save his skin, and that of his team mates was highly re-affirming. The panic induced haze lifted, replaced by the utter exhaustion from dumping himself into the invocation, and the residual visual effects from his masking by the fox. His own self-awareness returned, he noticed something very wrong. The mountain was certainly crushing the shadows, but it was looking… wrong. It was darkening, almost like the shadows them selves. The blood drained from Tevs already pale face. Dawn over Marblehead. Those shadows where corrupt spirits of nature. The horrors had caused their own brand of toxic spirits. Not even thinking of releasing his own spirit, Tevos turned his gifts against the corruptions directly.
"Back foul corruptions, back to whence you came!" Tev crushed a shadow, fading back to its own metaplane.

Waves of uncontrollable rage wash over the golder haired elf. The sight of the drained husks of the former Cairn dwellers fills Gypsy with a mindless hatred. The horrific abomination's apparent disdain for the trio's attempts to destroy it just pours fuel on an already raging inferno of emotion.

Any and all thoughts of team mates and tactics disappear as the all encompassing hatred blinds him to his surroundings. Disregarding his own safety, the sorcerer lets his just-erected magical protection slip away as he concentrates his full attention on the terrible beast's destruction. Once again Gypsy's fingers move in the complex dance that precedes the casting of his most effective combat spell.

Feelings of hate burst forth from deep within Sleel. Having sacrificed most of his humanity for his proffession had let him have a deep control over his emotions, coupled with the disassociation usually felt while rigging only enhanced this. Suddenly being overwhelmed with emotion after having controlled for so long shocks Sleel as he frantically orders his drones. "KILL KILL KILL KILL KILL!"

The shades pull slightly back at the groiup's counter-attack. Dogma is glad to see he managed to inspire the others out of their shock to fight off these things, but it's clear they aren't going to manage to fight off all the shades.

Still spewing curses at shades, who seem to recoil from his venemous Will, Dogma lines up his defenses and starts walking backwards to the mouth of the cave now that all his teammates are alright.

The shadows continued to dart through the midst of those fighting for their lives, fighting with their backs against the ocean, trying to escape the plague of spirits which has ripped through their numbers. The Mountain Spirit is suddenly gone, as Rebo shouts out his Mantra leaving the spirits with only 1 spirit target left to convert. A weakened Rebo, who now hovers before the spirit throng, but free to flee back to his body. Dogma starts pulling the rest of the team back, trying to get them with their backs in the cave instead of on the surface where they had no rear protection. The shades seem hesitant to approach either Dogma or Jack, both having little trouble dispersing any attackers. Even Tevos has no small amount of success, completely banishing a spirit into nothingness before the crowd of spirits.

Little mercy is showed though for Gremish or James, both who seem to have locked up in fear. As the team pulls back, their flight is perhaps too hasty. James is the first to start climbing down to the cave below as Gremish gives out a gurgling scream, startled by a shade pushing through him. In a frantic haste he tries to scramble down the side of the precarious cliff face, only to slip and fall directly on James. There is no doubt in the minds of the remaining team members that the dots down below were not going to survive the fall, what with them bouncing off the cliff sides like that. With renewed urgency, the team quickly pulls down into the cave face itself and finds that the shades do not follow.

Meanwhile in the caves below, the fury of the trio is enough to feed the vile creature of Hatred. Although obviously immune to all forms of attacks, the trio continues to pour everything into their assault until the dry clicking of the empty drone brings to mind the uselessness of the attack. The creature begins to walk away, back towards the entrance of the cave, leaving behind the carnage it had created on its path of massacre. Looking around Sleel and Slinky sees that Gypsy is laying on the ground some distance away, blood trickling from his nose and ears. Each of you is mentally and emotionally exhausted, feeling like you'd just cried your eyes out for hours after losing the most precious thing in your life. Your chest is heavy, your heart hearts, and you can barely keep your eyes open. Your bodies are shaking uncontrollably from residual adreneline coursing up and down your spine. It feels like you're about to fall flat on your face from the exertion, and as you look around, you don't see a single living caern dweller in sight. To make it worse, you see you've travelled alot deeper in the caves than you remember when the blind rage overtook you. Apparently he didn't stop his killing spree, he just spared the only people who showed any anger and hatred instead of fear.

Once Dogma sees Rebo managed to fully retreat his astral form and that the corruption of the Mountain Spirit has been forcefully stopped, the team fully retreats back into the cave, under harrassing attacks from the shades. Dogma misses the exact moment where it all goes wrong for Gremish and James. He merely sees his men tumble in horror below.

Dogma pushes that out of his mind for now.

The remaining three manage to complete their retreat into the cave. Fear and adrenaline pushes them to run quite deep back into the cave before they realise they are safe from the attacks.

Dogma finally stops, somewhere in the complete darkness of the tunnels. The bloody taste of adrenaline lingers in his mouth, his throat tight from panting.

The other two, running behind him, bump into him and also stop. The elf looks around in his coat, but notices he has lost his flashlight. He settles on opening his cyber eye lights instead, creating a narrow beam of light illuminating the visages of his team mates next to him.

"Hold on.. hold on" he weakily manages to say to the others. "We're ok now, we're ok now." He rests his back against the cold, humid wall of the tunnel, taking in deep breaths.

Rebo's face when the shades tore at him. Gremish's eye contact with him as he looked up, knowing he'd lost his grip.

"I'm going back to recharge guys! Meet me in the cairn!"

With that, Rebo heads directly for his body at 6,000 kph, picking up his assault rifle as soon as he returns to his body and making sure there's no other shadows nearby.

Tev didn’t see the great form of the mountain fade away, but he felt its presence vanish. The lingering signature was one very close, apparently Rebo had harshly banished it. Had Tevos been thinking right he’d have made sure to have words with him later. At least Fox was attuned to the ways of man, and not mountain. But for the moment his biggest concern was getting out alive. There was fighting to the death, and then there was knowing when to live to fight another day. Tevos stumbles shoulder to shoulder with Dogma, who was making a fighting retreat as well.
Of anyone on the team, Tev would most trust Dogma to watch his back, something about that elf and the no holds bar way he went at things if it went down, sat very comfortably with Tev. Turning to fall back Tev saw a momentary glimpse of Gremish running for the cliff face. Then nothing but two ear splitting screams and a series of slowly echoing sickening cracks as the bodies ricocheted down the cliff face.
“Oh dreck…” The words bounce around the cavern, over shadowed only by the exhausted panting from Jack, Dogma and Tevos.
Little other then an utterance, the shock of the causalities had not yet set in.

The team stands there, within the cave, numbers dwindled by the turn of events. One thing was obvious, they were only safe if they stayed in the Caern, it would not be safe to go back to the surface world with those Shades out there. They were in hell, and their only refuge was with the pleasant people who have hidden away for centuries in the caves below. Together they regather their wits, preparing for the journey back to their new home.

Rebo returns a split second later to the caves, his body feeling very painful as if it'd been ran over by a truck in his away time. A sharp pain came from his gut, and looking down he noticed that he was bleeding profusely from what appeared to be a blade wound. He should have been dead by now, but apparently a large percent of the wound was immediately carterized by the blade. Immediately Rebo felt his body going cold, a shiver running through his body. Despite that, through willpower alone, he crawled out to the entrance of his adobe to find the bodies of the Caern dwellers scattered across the length of the cave. All seemed dead, there were no signs of anyone left behind and alive here. And the bodies were withered beyond the point of recognition.

At a much slower pace, the pace of the exhausted and defeated, Dogma led his remaining men back down the the Cairn. No one said anything, and even though Dogma needing perhaps some comforting from this overwhelming despair, he kept a good distance ahead of the other two. Right now, he was crushed, defeated, withered, and his men needed to see strong leadership. In the darkness, the elf swallowed tears that welled in his eyes. Dogma hadn't cried since he was 6 years old. He didn't know why he felt like crying now. Must be another combat stress response.

During the long journey back, Dogma focused his will back and retook control of himself. He reminded himself that he was, afterall, a cold sonofaslitch. Cold like these walls. Cold like these walls. Cold like these walls...

Rebo grunts in pain as he becomes aware of his fresh new stab wound in his body.

How the frag did that get there? he wonders momentarily.

"Medic!" he yells, as he gets up and hobbles towards the carnage that lies before him.

"Damn these things," he mutters to himself as he investigates the bodies. "It's like they sucked the souls right out of them. We gotta stop these things."

Rebo winces again as the pain briefly sears, bringing him back to reality.

"MEDIC!" he yells again, hoping someone can treat this thing. He didn't want to be in less than top form fighting things like these...

Slinky pants, wiping spit from the corner of her mouth. Her metal arm comes away with a smear of blood. Her eyes catch the blood and echoes of rage draw her hands tightly into fists. A voice calls across the Cairn. Her vision clears and finds her teeth bared. The smugly retreating form of Hate saunters away, buoyed on a wave of siphoned emotion. She takes a few breaths and looks around for the others.

"Did you guys..." she pants some more, leaning down to rest her hands on her knees, "...hear something?" She stands, stretching her back, tasting blood in her mouth. She looks around, altered eyes taking in the husks of the Cairndwellers. I don't believe this. What is going on? Did we do this... help this...?

"Gypsy?" Slinky turns to the mage and helps him sit. "Gypsy, what is going on? I still don't get it. I mean, I know all that drek from uh... our place. The return of magic and the cycles and all that. But what is going on? Really, really. I mean..." She looks up as Sleel joins them, eyes hollow. She buries her head in Sleel's side, "Oh Andy..." she sobs.

"MEDIC!" the cry comes clearly now and Slinky starts away from Sleel sharing a look of panic with Gypsy and her brother.

"REBO!" they all say in unison. Drek, the girl thinks, Drekdrekdrek. She winds her way through the echoing walls leaping bodies and rock formations. ReboReboReboRebo. Over the com she says quietly, reassuring, "On my way, pal. Sit tight."

She tries to pick apart the course of the battle, but her mind shies away from memory and she doesn't force the issue, "Rebo, tell me where you are." She has the vague notion that up is the right direction so she heads that way. Eventually returning to the main cavern she scoops up her pack and fishes out the better of her medkits, signalling - if she can find him - the Cairndweller that had taken a liking to James, the 'doctor' fellow.

She finds a limping Gypsy and a still hollow-eyed Sleel on her heels, "Can you two see what happened to the Rock Guardian while I check on Rebo?"

Wish we could check in with Dogma... Stupid rock... she glances at the dim ceiling of stone above, feeling the weight pressing in. What was that? She stops, primitive instincts roused. She feels a slight tremor again. What? Oh... no. Not now. Not now. No earthquakes... She rushes to find Rebo, hindbrain shrieking alarm to get herself topside.

Gypsy is quickly awakened by Slinky's concern. He gets to his feet, head throbbing with each beat of his heart. Slowly, movement begins to happen throughout the caern as the dwellers slowly crawl out of their deepest darkest hiding places. There are so many fewer alive than dead now though, what once was in the thousands might now pass for a hundred. Wailing is heard throughout the caern, as family members seek out their lost relatives. The word "MEDIC!" is heard over the wailing, alerting the trio to the return of Rebo to his body. It doesn't take long to find him, the doctor fellow is already there with him, catering to his wounds. He looks up at the ceiling in concern moments before a rumbling is heard going through the earth. Emminant doom seemed to reign in, as the rumbling deepened. "Four hours now, the rumbling, I fear for the mountain.", the doctor says as he applies a salve like potion to Rebo's wound. Rebo groans as the pain triples, and the wound begins to bleed more profusely. The doctor holds him down, "We must get the blood flowing in order for it to heal.", he says. As the pain reaches an excrutiating level, it subsides to the soothing touch of the doctor as he presses leaves of some sort into the wound. "Oddly enough, you are the only one to survive any wound of the blades. There is nothing I can do for anyone else.", he says as the trio look questioningly on why the Doctor spends so much time on the one patient. Soon Rebo is on his feet, the pain nothing more than a slight nuisance.

Meanwhile in the caves above, the first of the rumblings is heard, a gutteral sound as the mountain fights to maintain its stand against the assault of the foul'd nature that had assaulted it. Dust falls on the heads of the wary travellers, and suddenly it becomes painfully obvious that the mountain may not survive. The only source of refuge is attempting to fall in on itself. If it does so, there are many thousands who will die in the caves below, including the rest of the Chosen Ones. The fear starts to well up within throats as realization comes that they risk death by horrors unbelievable on the surface, or death by entombing as tons of rock fall on their heads. As if to make the point, the ground again trembles, this time causing a large boulder to land in the path behind the team, blocking the only exit from this cavesystem.

Jack felt a certain cold detachment take over him as James and Gremish disappeared down the cliff. When allies fell, it was always sudden. That was just the way that things went. They made a fighting retreat back into the cave, and the shades started to hang back. "Tevos, is there anything following us?" he asked as they withdrew back into the tunnels. They were down three people. He hoped that Rebo would be back soon. He hoped the Rebo would tell the Cairn dwellers what had happened, that Gremish and James' fall had left them somewhere nearby. Once you reached terminal velocity, your chances of surviving a fall were the same no matter what the distance. If the water below had been deep, and if they had survived the fall, and if help could reach them soon enough...

It was going to be another eight hours before they could get back to the Cairn. He took off his shock gloves so that he didn't accidently waste any more discharges. That recharging scheme of Slinky and Sleel's would be a little harder to pull off if they had to face shades every sunset. And the entire island was lifeless, overrun. If they could find another tunnel system that led to the base of the cliffs, they could get to the coastline quickly, but where to go from there? Unless there was a forest or two of driftwood waiting for them, they'd have no way to get out onto the water and away from the shades.

"Sir?" Jack said suddenly to Dogma. "It's this way. I'm sure of it." He pointed down the fork in the tunnel opposite to the one the Boss was taking. Dogma gave him a chill look, but then back tracked a couple of steps. Jack recognized the look. He'd seen it often on the faces of the Knight Errant members holding the Wrigely dome, on the faces of the doctors when the bodies started coming in after the latest bug rush had ended.

He lost his footing when a tremor shook the tunnel, skinning his palms on the rough floor as he caught himself. He did not recall Tir Na Nog being tectonically active. A thin trickle of dust fell in front of him. This was bad. If they tried to return to the surface, it'd be full night, and those shades would be waiting. Perhaps, when they made it back to the cairn, they could find another way out. One that lead straight to the sea, perhaps. If they were subtle, and careful, perhaps they could scrounge enough to make boats. How far away was England? He recalled hearing somewhere, that before the veil had gone up, you could see the shores of England on the very horizon if you stood on the coast.

Maybe they should just wait it out for a while in the Cairn. A year or two, and maybe things would get better. The magic level might fall to the point where those horror shades would fade away, and it would be safe to go outside again. He wondered when, if that portal would reappear again. Ghostwalker had seemed to know ahead of time about the last appearance. If he knew about it appearing again, he might have another team ready, and they could be rescued.

Or maybe Ghostwalker knew about it because they'd told him. It was now a possibility that they could've met their employer thousands of years before they'd been born. Jack found it disquieting that perhaps the only reason that he was still alive after that disastrous run against Ghostwalker was because the dragon already knew that Jack would be working for him.

Stumbling along behind the tech-wiz and her brother, Gypsy attempts to block out the sight of the many dead Cairn dwellers scattered about the caverns. He casts his mind back over the strange encounter with the horrid creature, trying in vain to recall exactly what transpired during the catastrophic battle.

Barely reaching the wounded Rebo before collapsing once again, the elf promptly flops down, his back against the rough earthen walls. Head in hands, he watches as the doctor plies his primitive medicine on the psychic warrior, too exhausted to notice the exact techniques and herbs that the Cairn's healer is using. Even the tremors passing through the rock which he is leaning against don't sink in to his consciousness, instead being passed off as the shakiness of his drained condition.

Gypsy reaches out to gather mana, but gives up after only a brief attempt, the pain spiking in his skull almost too much to bear. He mops the blood from his face with his sweat-soaked bandanna, stuffing the now-grimy cloth into one of the inner pockets of his long armored jacket, then leans his head back against the walland takes the time to rest while the doctor finishes with his ailing team mate.

Taking note of Rebo's still-wounded state even after the rustic treatment, he tries to reassure the psionicist, but fails in his first few attempts to speak, his throat aching, too dry to form the words. Finally he manages to croak out a couple of sentences.

"G...give me a little time t...to recover and I'll see what I c...can do about fixing you up a little more permanently. What happened t...topside anyway? Are th...the others alright?"

"G...give me a little time t...to recover and I'll see what I c...can do about fixing you up a little more permanently. What happened t...topside anyway? Are th...the others alright?"

Rebo shakes his head.

"Gremish and James...they're gone. Jack and Dogma are heading back here, but it'll take them a while."

Rebo lays back down, resting while his psi power returns to him. Judging by the shriveled corpses laying all over the place, he was lucky to survive a sword strike by one of those shades - which he assumed had made his wound.

Two dead...that makes seven of us left. If that's what it takes to fend off one wave of these monsters, we're in trouble.

When Slinky hugs him, Sleel gently puts his arms around her, checking to make sure she wasn't physically hurt. He squeezes her in a hug briefly before she takes off after Rebo's voice.

Sleel orders his drones to head to where the other drones were landed, and orders them to power off to conserve power. He stumbles past Rebo, still shooken up about having his emotions forced out of him. As he goes by, he glances at Rebo and seeing him be treated, continues to where the drones are landed. Knowing fireing 500 rounds continuously isn't exactly the norm for the drones, he begins cleaning the machine guns, calibrating the recoil compensators, checking the sensors, and doing any other maintanence type things the drones would need including reloading the guns with ammo from the bin.

The cave now cast into near darkness, the only light source being the faint glow of eyelights. The rushing adrenaline crashed down around an emotionally drained Tevos.
"frag... fragging fracked... DAMMIT!" Tevos kicks a rock well into the darkness, the hollow thunk echoing around.
Loosing teammates was something that always weighed very heavily on his shoulders. He had lost people before, during the run in the reactor. It sent Tevos into a funk that lasted months. But Tevos and James had a groove, the kind of groove that only musicians get. But this wasn’t the time, nor the place to let emotions take over. And it struck him, Tev wanted to go HOME. Home, with his people, even though he realized they partially abandoned him, even though they where skeptical of him. But that caravan of busses and vans and RVs where his home. He had been ambushed, he hadn’t had time to plan one of his own, or do anything other then panic and run. He ran away, and 2 of his family here died because of him. 2 of his friends. Fox didn’t run, Fox finished it. Tevos didn’t finish that fight.
He sat down against the wall and hugged his knees, trying to keep from breaking down.
“We need to get back… tell the others…” his voice quivered.

Well, on the bright side, it can't get any worse..... right? That is the thought on the surface team's mind after about an hour of travelling. Things were starting to look up. They'd soon be back in the comfort of the Caern, assuming the mountain didn't fall. It was already obvious it would fall one day, since Ireland wasn't nearly this high in their age, and the water wasn't this close either. Was it going to fall today? As if to answer the question, the earth again trembled, causing dust to fall on the prespiring skin of the adventurers. A scratching could be heard against the rocks, as if something were crawling along it at an incredible speed. It was coming right for them, something fast. Then they saw it, at least those with enhanced vision. A spiderlike man was crawling towards them on the ceiling of the cave, and he was moving fast. Eight arms stretched out with clawlike talons on the edge of all of them. It couldn't get any worse, right?

In the deeper parts of the cave, the rumblings got worse. It was obvious the earth was trying to tell them something. All the Caern dwellers looked more than a little worried. You notice that many had apparently packed as much as they could and were congregating in the open space in the center of town. It seemed they were going to attempt a sojourn to the surface. The cave was obviously no longer safe from the Horrors, their guardian vanquished by one of the most powerful Horrors, and apparently no longer safe from the ravages of nature. Their only chance for survival was to find another place to live.

As the earth shook again, Dogma placed his hand on the side of the wall to stabilize himself. After an hour of walking, he felt slightly less weighed down by the events of the day. They were definatly neck deep in drek, but Dogma had a strong will and was capable of pulling himself together when it was required.

"Slippery rock here." Dogma called out again, warning his companions of treacherous obstacles in a monotone voice as he had been doing as they walked down the corridors. Everyone mechanically avoided the slippery rock.

Suddenly enhanced ears picked up a strange sound. A rustling, scratching noise coming from up ahead. Dogma stopped and narrowed his eyes. What the frag?. He peered into the darkness, Tevos and Jack doing the same.

Then his eye lights shone on a black, slippery looking sleek body, of some sort of multi armed spider man. It's skin was oozy and disgusting. And it was coming in FAST.

"WHAT THE FRAG" exclaimed the elf, out loud this time. He reflexively drew his gun and opened fire, wasting no time. Shoot first, ask questions never.

Another tremor shook the tunnel, worrying Jack. There must be a million tons of rock above his head. The smart place to be would be anywhere but under it. He hoped that the magic of the Cairn also could stabilize the rock somehow.

As the sound of falling stone ceased, the sound of skittering movement came from the ceiling of the tunnel further ahead. Jack froze for a second as something man sized and insect like came skittering towards them across the ceiling. For a moment his mind screamed, 'BUG!' Then he realized it wasn't, but that wasn't nessasarily better. Whatever it was, it was ugly, and malevolent looking, and coming right for them.

Spirit or corporeal? He wasn't sure, and he took a step back, drawing his pistol with one hand, slipping his other into a shock glove. Dogma seemed to have no doubts what so ever, drawing his gun and snapping off a round. By the time Jack had his pistol raised, Dogma had fired a second time.
--------------------------------

Rebo looks at the people walking out of the cairn.

"Hey guys...should we follow them?" he asks, not sure what to do. He couldn't even ask them where exactly they were going. Where was a Universal Translator when you needed one?

We've gotta come up with a way to stop those shadows, he thinks, his train of thought shifting as he waits for the reply of someone better suited to handle this situation than him.

Maybe I could devise a way to project psi force into the aural dimension...an Extradimensional Pulse...yeah, that could work...

Ignoring the activity around him for the moment, Gypsy sits forward, wincing with the effort, as he concentrates on Rebo's words.

"Wait a n...nano-second. What do you mean gone. D...did Dogma send them out to scout out a settlement? Or d...did they find an alternate way back to where we came from? Or ... or do you m...mean they are ... dead?

Running his fingers through his long golden hair, he once again leans back against the rocky wall of the cavern, before continuing in a lower tone.

"What exactly happened up there anyway?"

"They're dead," Rebo says. "They took a dive off the edge of the cliff...some sort of fear reaction to those shades."

"I tell ya, these things are worse than Aztlan blood entities...they managed to assimilate this mountain entity that was called forth. I had to shatter the thing before it turned on us too."

"I'm trying to find a way to counteract these things, to damage them, but it'll take time."

"Drek!"

Gypsy eyes the psychic warrior as he continues to speak, glancing to Slinky for some sort of confirmation of the tale before returning his gaze to Rebo.

"Shades? What shades?"

Blasting away at the creature doesn't even slow it down, it scurries past so fast it's hard to even make out its details. Moments later it disappears into the darkness you came from, apparently finished with whatever business it had in the depths below, or perhaps just fleeing from the falling mountain. You continue your journey, into the depths of the mountain, none saying much, for fear that the others might be thinking the same thing you're thinking. Dreary hours later you arrive at the entrance to the Caern to the most inhospitable sight you could imagine. The rock entity which protected the caern is in pieces, its body now being mostly powder which covers the floor. Stepping into the Caern, you see the bodies of thousands, dead and shrivelled from having spent ages dead in the stale air. Almost as if some horrible deed had happened years ago, and the process of decomposition were nearly complete.

Meanwhile, Rebo and Gypsy have a heart to heart, describing to each other the horrible things that happened, while Sleel and Slinky scrounge the drones together and rummage for supplies. The Caern Dwellers, with the exception of the Doctor, seem to do their best to avoid the Chosen Ones, almost venomously. A dark emotion can be felt in the Caern whenever one of the Team gets anywhere near other Caern dwellers. The Doctor explains that they were un-trusting in how the Chosen Ones could let this happen. Apparently they believed the Chosen Ones were here to protect them, but the Doctor states that he knows the Chosen Ones were here to save the world, not neccessarily to protect a small caern. He recommends the team move on quickly, for whatever their destiny was, it wasn't here.

"I think I could deal with this all a little better if things responded properly to being shot," Jack said, as he, Tevos, and the Boss backed down the corridor, careful in case that thing turned around and came back. They finally picked up the pace once it became clear that the thing wasn't, hurrying to get back to the rest of the team.

And then they made it back to the entrance to find the guardian dead.

"Fuck," Jack said, too numb to feel much of anything. They entered the Caern cautiously, but were stopped short by the sight of bodies everywhere. "Double fuck." He was too tired to deal with all of this. He just wanted to shut down and stop moving for a year or three. Had they lost everyone else too? It was like they were the patsies for a particularly insipid joke with the punchline, "And just when they thought it couldn't get any worse..." He didn't even want to go home anymore. He didn't want to do anything. He just wanted it all to stop.

When they finally arrive back to the Caern to find the Guardian a powedery memory on the floor, Dogma merely pauses an instant and steps over the remains. Again, seeing the withered corpses everywhere, the elf merely takes a look around, assessing the situation.

I feel nothing.

He switches his attention to his headware communication cyber, sending a team-wide message of <<Status report>>

He casts a sideway glance at a few live Caern dwellers gathering heavy baggages with sour expressions, noting the situationnal change.

"The shades," Rebo says to Gypsy. "You know, the...'spirits.' The ones that attacked. Those two teammates of ours just freaked out and tried to climb down the cliff after seeing them, but they didn't make it."

Rebo sighs.

"If it takes two of our lives just to ward off one wave of these things, we're in big trouble. I'm sure I can come up with a psi attack to hit them, but I'll need six days. I'm just hoping these attacks aren't a nightly occurance."

"Present, fully functioning," Jack transmitted back. If he thought he was being funny, he gave no indication of it in his tone or facial expression. Nor did his expression betray how intently he was listening to the radio bands for a response.

After an initial few moments of confusion, Gypsy and Rebo manage to fill each other in on the details of their experiences since the team seperated. The shade-like creatures that the psionicist describes puzzle the sorcerer just as much as the eight-armed, sword-weilding monstrosity that assaulted the cavern.

As they discuss the problem, the elf remains resting against the wall, trying to regain some of his strength from the exhausting encounter. By the time the remainder of the surface team returns to the cavern, he finally feels up to the effort of spellcasting effectively.

Running his hands over the barely-healed wound in Rebo's abdomen in a series of practiced gestures, Gypsy gathers the mana necessary to perform magical healing and channels it into the psychic warrior's body.

The team is together again, for the first time in almost a day. Shy 2 members, but seemingly fit enough for further adventure. The rocks seem to suggest the same thing as there's more rumbling, and dust starts to fall on the heads of those gathered. The doctor seems to have joined your group, his family had died in the attack, and his sole goal in life seems to have become an obsession with insuring your success against the Horrors. "Come, let us get out of here. The citizens have already left, it is only us, and I fear that if we don't move soon, your destinies will come to a frightfully short halt."

Once everyone radioed-in or verbally check-in when gathering to the elf's position, Dogma was relieved to see he had not lost more companions, and that Gypsy had expertly taken care of a wound Rebo had sustained.

The tale of the eight-armed Hate entity was howver considerably troubling. Once again, bullets had been useless. Even Gypsy's spells had bounced, this time. No deals to be made with common enemies. No information to trade to avoid hostilities. No bullets to the back of the head to end trouble-makers. Dogma continued to feel out of his element. He concentrated on his leadership, instead.

Having no other options, Dogma had everyone follow the good Doctor. Once they were underway, the team leader got around to asking the doctor where they were heading, almost as an afterthought.

After finishing his maintanence on his drones, Sleel checks in with the rest of the team on what happened. Upon hearing that the cave system is likely going to collapse, he sadly goes to check his drones power levels.

"I'd like to know the fastest possible way to get out, so that I can send my drones down it to conserve the most power. I don't need to lose more of them simply because we were too slow in finding an exit."

Sleel decides to leave his drones where they are for the moment, giving them orders to catch up every 100 meters, then power off then catch up, and so on.

Feeling the healing psi power wash over him, Rebo suddenly feels a lot better.

"Thanks, man," he says to Gypsy, very appreciative that such a severe wound has been dealt with so fast. He needed to be in top form for the coming fights.

Rebo's thoughts are suddenly interrupted by the rumbling and feeling of dust falling on his head.

"Damn," he says. "This place isn't going to hold up much longer. I think we oughta follow the doctor; anywhere's gotta be safer than here."

Jack watches Sleel's prepartions with his drones for a bit. "If you're that worried about power, we could just haul them. Rig up a travois if we have to."

He turned to Dogma. "We should probably stay on combat until, although I suppose that's more an 'if' than a 'when,' we find some safe place to rest up. Who do you want on point, and who do you want brining up the rear?"

The team begins its trek up the mountain, the depth they were at meant it would take a good 6 hours minimum to reach the surface at a fast pace. The shaking mountain seemed to be doubling that time. Dust rained almost as regular as rain itself, making visibility and breathability nominally difficult. The doctor followed you, as he had no idea how to get out, having spent his life in the Caern. It did seem odd though, that not a single caern dweller was passed, despite them leaving only minutes before you, and quite a few of their numbers being very old, or too young. Almost as if they'd used a different exit. By the end of the first hour, you're positive that you're taking a very different path than the other dwellers. Wether that was good or bad was debateable, but it seemed wise to stick with what you know instead of branching out to try to find whatever other path might lie ahead. Behind you, to the read, a large groaning sound is heard, as the mountain begins, what was surely, its crumble. As if to verify, a dust cloud swept past you like a sand storm, through the caves. Everyone is nearly knocked off their feet in the attack of nature. The drones would need serious cleaning after this excursion.

As the team continues the arduous trek through the passage toward the surface, Gypsy falls in beside Dogma.

"So what's the plan? I mean, after we get to the surface, where do we go from there? From what you all have said about those Shade-things, we can't very well just venture across the countryside after dark. Not safely anyway!"

Gypsy looks around at the drawn faces of the remaining members of the team before turning his attention back to the other elf.

"That isn't even taking into account that eight-armed Hate critter."

Dogma found it very odd they did not meet other Caern dwellers. How could they have known of another exit, that the doctor did not know about? There was no reason to distrust the doctor, but Dogma set out to thoroughly discover his character and see if there wasn't anything he had "forgotten" to tell them. This was, afterall, Dogma's speciality.

The young team leader had of course put Jack on point. Sleel's drone, by virtue of the orders the rigger had given them, had the rear.

The trek would be long, which was good for Dogma's "friendly" interrogation method. It gave him time to pause between questions to the doctor. In one such loll, Gypsy came up to ask the elf some questions, questions which were on the mind of all, no doubt.

"So what's the plan? I mean, after we get to the surface, where do we go from there? From what you all have said about those Shade-things, we can't very well just venture across the countryside after dark. Not safely anyway!"
"That isn't even taking into account that eight-armed Hate critter."

"Yeah, I know. The good news is by the time we reach topside, it'll be day again. The shades only seem to come out at night. We could use the daylight to set up a ward, but staying in one spot isn't going to do us much good."

Dogma didn't specify they would die of dehydration if not from shade attacks, but the odds that Gypsy hadn't thought of that weren't very high.

"The only real option seems to be to reach the verdant coast we saw. But we don't have a boat, and we have no boat making materials. I'm hoping magic can assist us somehow on this. A water elemental, or seas spirit, or something, might be able to ferry us. Can you put your mind with Rebo's and see if you can think of any spell or magic trick that could help us in this way? I'll ask the Doctor if he has any ideas."

Dogma returned his steely gaze to the Caern dweller, and returned for another round of questionning.

Dead. All dead. Slinky swallowed, gagging on the damp cool of the deep cavern air. They were fleeing the caves. To the surface and the hateful world of the Horrors. There was no question, this was their world. Slinky’s nerves still rang from their encounter with Hate. Thoughts of the abomination brought bile and wretched memories, bones singing with a sick ache. Stumbling, young woman pitched forward under her burdens, metal arms shooting out to catch her, reflex bouncing off her spinal column faster than she could register it with her more sluggish meat brain. She couldn’t banish the grim images of the cairn dwellers as they fell in writhing husks. Or the baleful looks of the cairn dwellers as they abandoned the only sanctuary they knew. She vomited. Again. The grate of a boot in the dust behind her let her know that Gypsy waited just behind her. She spat out bitterness and struggled upright, accepting Gypsy’s hand. Dead. His eyes are dead. I’m dead. We’re all dead. Her eyes fell on her small hand in the elf’s fine-boned one. Dead as that. Sensors registered warmth from Gypsy’s hand. More warmth than is normal – even for a hot-running elf. Sick? Is he sick? Dung lung? She stood, concern creasing her brow waving off the stale water the pale-haired elf offered, instead pulling his head down to her.

She shoved the bandana off of his brow and placed her hand across his forehead, peering into his eyes, “How are you feeling?”

Feeling Dogma’s eyes on her she queried their leader without breaking her sharp gaze at Gypsy, “You’re next.”

A deep rumbling brings more flight panic bubbling to Slinky’s forebrain. Her stomach clenches, sore from bouts of vomiting. She dives away from the cave in, taking Gypsy down with her. She stands, brushing herself off and running quick diagnostics. She gives Gypsy a hand up and looks up the cavern, her eyes finding Sleel crouched over his drones speaking quietly to them. If that’d happened a minute ago we’d have lost Andy. She swallows grit and acid and her eyes move slowly to the pile of stone behind them.

“But, the circle,” she murmurs at the pile of rock and rubble sealing them off from the arcane circle that had brought them here. Tears well in Slinky’s eyes. “We have to use it to get back,” she runs at the pile of the cave in, hurling rocks away in a desperate attempt to recapture the sliver connecting them to her real life, her real world. Her home.

Home.

With a cry she flails at the rock pile, pounding it with her fists, sending shards of stone and dust flying. She shrugs off the others as they try to pull her away from the cave in. Andy’s voice, from the front of the group makes her stop, “Leola, we have go.” She collapses to her knees, shaking with sobs as his calm voice continues, “I need you to help me get the drones to the surface. C’mon Slink, we’ve got work to do.”

C’mon Slink, we’ve got work to do. An invocation as powerful as any of the spell caster’s – big brother letting his kid sister tag along. Slinky nods, lost, swallowing the knot in her throat and lets Dogma lead her back to the group.

She calls to the doctor on her way up to Sleel and his drones, “Got anything in your medicine pouch to treat a nervous breakdown, Doc?”

Jack's nerves were wearing pretty ragged. The mountain was rumbling above them and he worried that every turn would bring them face to face with that hate demon. He kept his shockgloves on. The Boss had told them how little effect bullets had had on the demon.

At first, he kept constant radio contact, looking for signs of the people that had passed before them. It only took him a little while to realize that no one had. It made him feel a little disjointed, having gone from a regular guy, to chosen one, to pariah over the course of such a short time.

There was almost no warning before the tunnel started dropping behind them, the dust cloud and shockwave knocking everyone off their feet. Jack had to take the protective covers off his eyes and wipe the dust off, firing off a couple of extra electro-static cleaning discharges from his eyes to get the rest of the dust out before he put them back on.

"Everyone okay?" he radioed back, then proceded on when Dogma gave him the all clear. He wet down a handkerchief and wrapped it over his mouth and nose regretting that he'd never gotten around to getting that internal air tank.

"I need you to help me get the drones to the surface. C'mon Slink, we've got work to do."

Sleel waits for Slinky to catch up with him before putting his arm around her shoulders while they talk and walk. "Hey now, we've been in worse scrapes than this, I've got my buddies, and you've got me, and we've all got the rest of the team, we'll pull through this. Just like always."

Just like always. I just wish I could believe it myself...

Disappointed in the outcome of his conversation with Dogma, the elven sorcerer drops back in order to discuss the subject with Rebo.

'Spirits! What the hell does that have to do with me?'

As they progress upwards, Gypsy once again surveys the remaining members of the team. Passing the remains of the Circle, now buried under the rubble of the cave-ins has a chilling effect on everyone, but seems to drive home the point that there was no returning to their own time there.

'This whole thing seems to be taking it's toll on everyone. Slinky seems to be close to totally losing it, and to be honest I don't feel that far behind her. There just doesn't appear to be any way out of our current situation.'

Settling in beside the psychic warrior, the elf again questions him on the conditions of the surface, discussing what they can reasonably expect to do about surviving beyond the relative safety of the cavern system.

Dogma's conversation with Meneer, seems to provide little to no information. Sheltered from the beginning of his life til now, he has no idea what's on the outside, except the tales told to scare kids into staying asleep. The spirits, or shades as Dogma liked to call them, sounded like one of the fairy tales told to kids to keep them under their blankets at night. In that tale, the spirits were not intelligent enough to perceive that a blanket was anything more than a minor object on the path, and to remain under it, one would be safe because the shades never looked under the blankets. Dogma talks for hours, learning much about Horror Lore in the process, but eventually the rumblings get far too loud. Realization occurs to the team, quite a bit too late to stay put, but, if the caves survived to the future, where they started, the caves were probably quite safe, despite every rumble that is heard. As a matter of fact, the only place lost in the future, is the Caern, and the top of the mountain.

Suddenly, as if to bring falsity to these realizations, the mountain again rumbled, but this time to such an extreme that the earth shook. Shook so strongly that nobody could move forward at all, their bouncing forcing them to put all attention on not slamming into the walls head-first. Panic hit as the mountain finally gave way, there was no denying the sound, stone grated for miles, it was painful to everyones ears as the entire shelf above them slid into the ocean. Everyone grabbed at something, but fear caused them to let go, for who knew where the rocks would crash down, impaling their hands between tons of rocks? Minutes dragged by, the earth shaking as if to force the tram to fall back down the throat of the cave, into the caern, many many meters below. After what had to be at least 20 minutes, the rumbles started to die down, but the air was unbreathable. Dust filled the lungs of everyone, and every cough that was forced out of your throat caused you to inhale more dust than was cleared. It was obvious that your deaths were to be, not from battling horrors in the depths of hell, but to die of asphyxiation, as nature did its plunge into the ocean.

Shifting the small pile of dirt and rubble that has come to rest on top of him, Gypsy gingerly rises, hacking and coughing up the dust clogging his lungs. As soon as he manages to catch his breath for a moment, the elf quickly passes his hand over the lower half of his face, working a small cantrip to enable him to breathe freely.

Shifting his perception to the Astral, the sorcerer scans his surroundings to locate the other members of the team. Acting quickly, Gypsy circulates among his companions repeating the small spell, starting with Slinky, then Dogma, followed in short order by Tevos, Rebo, Sleel and Jack before getting to the doctor, Meneer.

Only after he completes his initial spellcasting does he double-check to see if any of his team mates are actually injured and require further medical assistance.

Jack coughed and choked, the dust caking so thickly over his handkerchief that it became a solid mass over his mouth and nose. He hugged tight to the ground, trying to keep from being rattled off the ceiling as well as the walls. Now they knew what happened to make the trek down to the chamber so short in the future.

After Gypsy finished going around, giving everyone a mana fueled areation, Jack rejoined the group, sitting back against the wall of the tunnel. Everyone was now the same monochrome shade of earth brown. As everyone else got themselves together, he mulled over the snatches of conversation he'd heard from Meneer. "So does that mean when we get back topside, all we have to do to keep ourselves safe from the shades, at least, is pitch a tent and sit quietly inside?"

---------------------------------

Dogma's conversation with the doctor, Meneer, provides much interesting insight both into the Caern Dweller's beliefs, as well as the general state of this world. The talk also stimulated the ultra-social elf, who hadn't had a good chat with someone new since getting to here. Or is that to "now"?

Jack radioed in every now and then, mostly after a particularly loud rumble would shake everyone. Sleel and his sister Slinky were chatting while bringing up the drones. Gypsy and Rebo discussed desperate theories on how magic could get them across the water. It was always funny to see the psionist automatically correct the sorcerer on his magical vocabulary.

All in all, at least until they reached the surface, everyone could relax a little, and it was nice to see.

Then the world slid from under their feet. Dogma lost his footing and slid to a fall. His air filters beeped alarms in his head, indicating they could not compensate for all the dust in the air. Dogma felt his brain rattle for what seemed like an eternity, while choking for air. No coherent thought formed in his head other than "I'm going to die in the past". The shaking stopped, but the air was thick with dust, unbreathable. Suddently, he felt a hand pass over his mouth, and then fresh oxygen filled his lungs.

Recovering his wits, he stood up, pebbles and rocks slidding off of where they had fallen on him. He saw Gyspy quickly move amongst the team and finish his spell on everyone.

His team seemed alright. Everyone was getting up, making faces at sore spots where they had fallen hard or where rocks had bruised them. Jack made his way back to where everyone was from the few meters ahead where he'd been. A sigh of relief at seeing everyone alright came from him.

"Well then." Smartly stated Dogma