Twelve

[Planetkiller II]

I'm starting to DM now. I will post when ND does.

[No Dachi]

I won't be posting untill the end of the week. I have school as well as two separate people pressuring me to do work on two separate threads, so go ahead without me and I'll post over the weekend in time for the next DMing, as long as that isn't a problem.

[Planetkiller II]

Fire
Currently, no such way exists. The key of Fire is sealed behind many barriers. This is one of many reasons the 12 were chosen, for their locations coincided with that of the first four keys, those not sealed behind barriers of space, magic and force. I can help you tear down these barriers. BUT NOT IF YOU CONTINUE TO BE SO DEPRESED.

Jasmine snorted as the words echoed alternately inside her mind and in flaming letters upon the enchanted page. The thing did read her thoughts, yes, but it would not control her emotions by yelling at her... thinking at her... whatever. The paper continued to spout out its wierd half words.

I will push directions into your friend Warder's mind, that will leave space in here for... other things. Your friend may feel a slight pain.

An understatement, to say the least. Warder lost his calm demeanour for the first time in a short time Jasmine had known him, doubling over and holding his head. A few seconds later he straightened up and brushed some imaginery specks of dust from his suit. He spoke, slightly ruffled, but none the less sure of himself.

"Follow me. We're going to Saturn."


Chaos
Cid heard the Arachnoid screech as his staff found a fleshy point in its underside where there was no glowing, electrified armour to protect it. It wasn't going to kill it, but he considered that the wound might slow the spider-like animal down a little. Satisfied that the blow had connected with as much damage as he could safety do there, Cid rolled forward, through the crushing, writing mass of scything legs. He emerged unscathed, at least relatively so. One leg point had made a gash along his arm. Black blood oozed out, but it was less than a flesh wound to a demonic who was almost dead in the first place. Cid brought his glowing staff up once more, smashing it into the spineret at the rear of the beast. This did not quite have the effect he had envisioned. Instead of the blow being a mere annoyance as before, the entire spineret deformed badly, and the beast it was attached to screamed out in obvious agony. Cid realised he had found the weakspot he required. He stood, charged the staff up to its absolute limit, and brought it down in a hammer blow that could have smashed permacrete. The necromantic energy he had accumilated in his weapon blasted into the fleshy web spinner and popped it like an overlarge balloon. Cid ran for his life, rapidly hardening petrillium gas settling all about him as it coallesed into its fibre form. He fell to the floor, covered in the sticky stands. He looked back, knowing that if the Arachnoid was still coming he would be finished, since he could not move at all. Fortunately, it was not. Instead, it lay on the floor, its rear body segment crushed and the bright lightning that covered its skin dieing away. Its babies moaned a collective misery and rushed over to their fallen mother, Cid forgotten. If these were normal circumstances, the tiny spiders would all die quickly without their parent. These however, Cid had no idea about. He struggled to free himself from the fibres, which in conjunction with the rest of the strands about the cavern were no doubt worth more than he had ever owned. It was time to move on, he still had a job to do...


Lightning
ooc// Hey, did I say he was dead? //ooc

Bakan was pleased to see that the cultists had indeed fried most efficiently. The wave had taken up a decent ammount of power, but they certainly did noy know that, and over a third of his enemies were now dead of incapacitated. Of course, the guardian was still there, and his power was an unknown factor. The mechanical man was speaking again in its wierd synthesised voice. He was almost laughing.

"HA! An impresive display, certainly, but I think it unlikely that you could take my might on unaided. With my Key, I can assure you that your gifts would be like that of an insect's to me. However, I shall indulge your curiousity, for sheer audacity. I am Technosis, the Advanced. I am here because I was imprisoned here some many ages ago by short sighted mages that had no idea what they were truely doing. As to what I am... I am not truely sure anymore. Once I was mortal, though empowered much like yourself. I was human... I think, but when I was chosen to become a Key Guardian that all changed. I was given more power than ever before, power over technology, and I abused it. My memories fade over time, but I know that I 'improved' my form until I became more machine than mortal. What am I for? If you do not know already by my talk of Keys and Guardians, further explaination will not help you. Now, what are YOU here for?"


Earth
Garion blasted out into a tunnel, managing to stay on his feet, but only just. He swayed slightly, then turned his rocky head three hundred and sixty degrees, getting a full view of where he had ended up. It looked like a side passage of some form, for it was certainly not a main tunnel, being as it was only large enough for two people (or perhaps one golem). Suddenly, his hearing, amplified now he was underground, picked up voices. It sounded like Squatish, which likely meant there were dwarves about. This seemed odd though. There shouldn't be any miners underneath a public, in use station. It simply wasn't safe. He listened carefully, and heard one switch to Basic.

"What're we doing down here anyway? There's been no arachnoids or even petrillium fibres down here for decades, so what's the point?"

Then a second voice answered, deeper, more commanding.

"Because the boss says so. She's paying us well enough isn't she? Besides, we've accepted now, and you really don't want to annoy Freya."


Technology
Tex followed, remaining stealthy and invisible. The pair seemed to be fairly important, from the way the security stood to attention whenever they passed. He had to keep moving to listen in, but Tex managed to hear a few sentances. The Slyph spoke first, is a voice that contained none of the fear that it should be displaying due to being down in such a cramped space.

"Destra, this is getting worrying. If the instruments are correct, he's gotten free. That kind of energy spike... well, it has to be the portal. I think those hysterical news reports got something right for once, and those 'cultists' were real, and were helping him, somehow. You know he'll be coming."

The human nodded, but remained impassive.

"Perhaps so, Sinistra, but it may not matter. How is he going to find us here? The Key is shielded, and no one knows exactly what we have except us and the other minions. We can still finish this, we can still win."

The two walked through a large doorway, marked 'Operations' and a very heavy, thick door closed behind them before Tex could make it through. The last thing he saw of them was them smiling while they unzipped their bio-haz suits.


Magic
Suprisingly, the book didn't exhibit any form of magical power at all. Not even a hint of a spark. Gokan's flicking through found a lot of pages that were undecipherable, written in ancient languages or letterings. There seemed to be several references to something like the 'time lock' which could well refer to the Great C-Lock. The book referenced it as a mythical device that came into action when creation was in peril, built before time began. There wasn't a whole lot of information, but that was to be expected, since no one had ever been know to have been there. Until now. It did hypothesise that the clock could be at the centre of the solar system, but went on to say that it could equally be outside time and space itself. This was all at the beginning of the book, but from the quick read Gokan had done, the majority of the book was concerned with actual history, and the rest with rumors about temporal magic. No one had ever satisfactorally proved that it even existed at all. So much for that. The only other useful thing he had found without searching for something specifically was that if temporal magic existed, which it clearly did, it would take enormous quantities of energy. Even a few hours would take a sizeable fraction of the universe's total energy. This certainly would explain why no mages were gifted with this kind of ability, for no body could support that kind of power.

[Planetkiller II]

All done. Postness time.

[AcidK]

*Cid stood up from the fibres that entaggled him, not really caring much that his tattered robe was still covered in small amounts of the fibre. From here Cid only thought of where he was and where he was supposed to be heading. After a while he continued through the caverns in the opposite direction of the fallen Arachnoid, smiling somewhat that he had beaten the beast, but the smile faded when he realised he needed a good, long rest when he gets back to wherever it was that caused this. Little Measter burst out of some of the sticky fibres behind him, struggling a little to keep up as some of the fibres dragged at him.*

Come Measster, wwe are not ffinisshed yet.

[Zappa Tenderlea]

The guard's faces instantly fell at the first deep growls that came from the entrance to the hall. 'Terror' stood there, growling deeply, paws apart and teeth gleaming. He padded softly forward, and the guards half heartedly raised their spears in his direction instead of Rofellos'. The giant lynx was now only a few metres in front of the armoured faeries. He stared at them with piercing feline eyes, and roared. That did it. Three out of the four guards ran for it. The fourth mumbled something that sounded like 'let's get him lads, quick!', before he noticed that he was actually alone. He too decided discretion was the better part of valour when Rofellos' body began to grow, muscles bulging with magically enhanced power. Within only a few more seconds, all that was left was the official, who seemed to have been rooted to the spot, and a shield that crashed to the floor, the metallic echoes seeming louder now there were so few people about. 'Terror' wandered passively up to the now rather large Rofellos, and nuzzled his chest with a giant furry head that would have sent a smaller man flying, before trying to thread through his legs like a house cat. Despite being large, Rofellos hadn't gotten that big, so the lynx gave up and lay down heavily on the stone flagstones and cracking several of them, where he rolled over and began to purr gently. The official, still looking frightened despite this display, tried to back away, but found the heavy door to the council chamber in the way...

can I pass now, or do I hurt you first?

Garion took a moment to figure out what to do. He then let himself move into the cave wall and useing the earth for cover he quickly noved towards the dwarves. Reasoning that he might be able to find out who this Freya was. If he got lucky he might even pick up a clue as to where he could find this key he was looking for. Maby he'd even get to do some fighting. Since he was normaly stationed to guard the sacred temple where nobody ever came it had been a while since he'd been able to fight anyone except for training.
As he came closer to the dwarves he stoped and listened closely. He also dared to look around a little which ment he'd have to stick his head out through the wall a little so his eyes would surface, trying to keep as little of himself as possible showing.

[Hewitt]

*Jasmine raises a slight eyebrow at Warder's casual demeanor before looking back at the psychic parchment.*

"Slight pain?"

*Shaking her head, Jasmine stuffs the will in her back pocket and walks over to Warder.*

"Okay then. Lead the way."

ooc: Can't think of much else to do in this situation... Oh wait a sec

*As the pair leave the room the animately rude desk lets rip with another loud belch, sending metal paperclips flying in all directions.*

"An authoritive piece of paper and a glutenous writing desk. Am I to meet a pen with greed issues next hmm?"

ooc:

[Planetkiller II]

More posting, less silence...

[Zappa Tenderlea]

more DMing then...

[Spritely Zombie]

Gokan carefully replaces the book, locking the case with another subtle manipulation of magical energy. He ponders for a while.

If a few hours would take a sizeable portion of the universes total energy. It's possible that the use of the C-lock itself, causes the destruction we're supposedly trying to prevent... But that can't really be it... Can it? Surely the C-lock reacted to the destruction, rather than simply activating and causing it...

Gokan frowns and begins searching for any references to the keys, location, forms, abilities and summaries of any studies carried out upon them, all the while conscious of the passage of time.

I sure hope someone finds a key soon. We can't have much more time left before everything explodes, implodes, ceases to exits, transforms into a small pink pony or whatever it is that's going to happen.

[Ur_Quan]

Sorry PK I've been busy with other things and I'm trying to think of a good reply, that goes for ICE9 as well.

I'm going away for 3 weeks for my summer break. And won't have acces to the internett. I'll try to post if we go visit anybody or sumtin. Try to do some dming by the time I get back

[Planetkiller II]

Chaos
Cid left the cavern as hastily as possible, continuing to follow his insticts down further into the bowels of the mines. The darkness was almost absolute now, but the necromancer's eyes were uncaring. His lenses began to glow a deep red as they adjusted to the low light, but suddenly he turned into a passageway light by soft artificial light. Cid quickly ducked back into the darkened side passage he'd come from as his eyes refocused. There shouldn't be anything man made this deep. Even the miners would never have come down here, where the arachnoids nested. The fibres would be clogged with small creatures caught up in them and useless. Cid peered round the corner, and upon finding it empty, walked slowly into it. Someone had linked up some standard spotlights and layed down some walkways. The tunnel looked artificially rounded too. A lot of effort had gone into making this place habitable again. Cid decided to find out why, moving quietly along, Little Measter at his heels. The passage opened up to a ledge, overlooking a pit. The pit was a hive of activity, dwarves running about with pickaxes and shovels. In the bottom of the area was a perfectly rounded egg-like structure, that appeared to be what the dwarves were digging out. As one digger accidentally hit the obsidian-black egg, another lightning bolt like the one Cid had seen much easier blasted out of its top and lanced upwards, flaming the unfortunate squat as it did so. As its fellows rushed in to see what happened, CId realised that he must be at the bottom of the shaft that he had found when he first entered the caverns.


Nature
The official did not answer, but laid a hand on the massive doors. Ever so slowly, they swung inwards. As they did so, a light like nothing Rofellos had ever seen eminated from the gap. It danced and undulated in front of his eyes, bending in strange patterns and wriggling out into the rest of the world. As the doors creaked fully open, the light abated and Rofellos took a single step inside. As he did so, the official spoke again, this time with confidence once more.

"The Council will not tollerate this, mage. They will take recompense for disrupting their meditation. Goodbye, for I doubt I will see you again."

The doors swung shut twice as fast as they had opened, and Rofellos was left standing inside the chambers. Torches ignited around the walls of the room, revealing a rather simple place. Only the floor was really decorate, with a complex mosaic in red and blue. Green marble pillars held up a similarly patterned roof. In the very centre of the room lay a metre tall black plinth, carved with the same kind of strange patterns Rofellos had seen in the light. Perhaps then the room wasn't THAT simple, but it was certainly less grand than Rofellos had expected. The most important feature of the chamber though, was the twelve thrones that stood, equally spaced around the edge of the chamber. Upon them, imobile, sat twelve wizened old faeries. Six sprites, six elves, half male, half female. Finally, after a long pause, one of the sprites spoke.

"What is your business here, sprite?"


Earth
Garion's eyes opened just a fraction as he poked them through the wall. The two dwarves, beards dark with dust and soot, were wandering past as he squinted out into the tunnel. They carried Ingretti Talon 14 assault rifles, and a variety of nasty looking tools and gadgets on their belts. They were still talking as they went. One seemed to be complaining rather a lot, the other less so.

"What are we doing guarding an abandoned drill site anyhow?"

"There's supposedly some kind of archeological discovery down here. Some kind of really old containment device that no one knows what it was for."

"You honestly think Freya and Loki would employ a small army of mercenaries to guard a relic? Come on, something's going on down here that we don't know about."

"Oh I don't know, there's supposed to be a lot of money in historical finds these days. Besides, do you really care so long as we're paid."

"No, I Guess not."

With that, they continued on, deeper into the tunnels.


Fire
"Who knows Miss Hewitt. However I suspect we may see stranger things before the day is done, if these instructions are any indication."

Warder strode from the room and down the steps without looking back, however when he came to the hover limo he stopped to wait for Jasmine. The Will was talking to her again by that point.

Why exactly do you want to use that clanking piece of human-tech. I can teleport you both by fire a short way, to somewhere that you can use a more effective means of transport.

It didn't bother to wait for permission. Firey tendrils began to unfurl from the page, and wrap themselves around the two, creeping up their clothing without burning. At the moment that they became entirely surrounded by flame, there was a sense of rushing and a momentary sense of rushing and the briefest glimpse of something... wrong. Then it was gone, and they appeared on the platform of Exodus Station as if they had always been there. People rushed past, dashing into the energy powered teleporters that would take them to the corresponding destinations on other worlds.

"Despite this being our destination if we had used normal transport, I still don't know how we can get through customs easily. Teleporter time usually gets booked a few months ahead. Got any ideas?"


Magic
Gokan was just beginning to read carefully into the great void of non-information about the twelve keys when something permeated the stone door to the vault. A twisting stand of light that reflected and patterned strangely off the walls. The short beam suddenly changed direction, and plunged straight through Gokan's chest. In the instant that it was touching him, Gokan got a flash of where it had come from, and a feeling of great power eminating from the council chmber that spewed it out into the world. He even felt the prescence of the nature mage that had entered the chamber. Somehow he felt like he'd met the sprite before. The librarian took that moment to return, opening the stone gate. Gokan hid the open case and book behind his back. Arcana spoke hurriedly.

"Did you see that? The lights, they fired across the whole library. Are you alright? Well, I'm afraid I'll have to ask to to leave for now, I need to check on the vault's contents, to see what that beam might have done to them. I will of course leave you to put away whatever you might have been reading first. I'm sorry about this. Feel free to come back say, tomorrow and I'll be happy to let you back in. I'll be just outside."

[Zappa Tenderlea]

The official did not answer, but laid a hand on the massive doors. Ever so slowly, they swung inwards. As they did so, a light like nothing Rofellos had ever seen eminated from the gap. It danced and undulated in front of his eyes, bending in strange patterns and wriggling out into the rest of the world. As the doors creaked fully open, the light abated and Rofellos took a single step inside. As he did so, the official spoke again, this time with confidence once more.

"The Council will not tollerate this, mage. They will take recompense for disrupting their meditation. Goodbye, for I doubt I will see you again."

The doors swung shut twice as fast as they had opened, and Rofellos was left standing inside the chambers. Torches ignited around the walls of the room, revealing a rather simple place. Only the floor was really decorate, with a complex mosaic in red and blue. Green marble pillars held up a similarly patterned roof. In the very centre of the room lay a metre tall black plinth, carved with the same kind of strange patterns Rofellos had seen in the light. Perhaps then the room wasn't THAT simple, but it was certainly less grand than Rofellos had expected. The most important feature of the chamber though, was the twelve thrones that stood, equally spaced around the edge of the chamber. Upon them, imobile, sat twelve wizened old faeries. Six sprites, six elves, half male, half female. Finally, after a long pause, one of the sprites spoke.

"What is your business here, sprite?"

I am greatly saddened that I am forced to disrupt your meditation like this, wise ones, but the sake of the world depends upon it. without doubt, you all know of the great C-lock, the twelve keys, the keeper of time, and what he stands for, so I will not bother you with an explanation.
In a matter of hours from now, our world will end. 12 people were chosen by the C-Lock to stop this from happening, and I am one of those people. I seek one of the keys, but to find it, I must find the tomb of master Aerie. The wise tree in the Shrine of Aerie told me this:

"The key that you seek was known by my master Aerie. He once sought it, but failed. The Wand of the King, held by the lord of faeries, the King known as Asgadra. Aerie thought he could be found beneath the ground at the moon's northern pole. The city of Tyfaris has been built there in recent times. It has no nature. No soul. I wish you luck mage. "

the nature of the last shrine between the shrine of Aerie, and this town, told me this:

"Traveller, Asgadra awaits you. He will not let the key go easily. If you go to the grave of the one known as Aerie, you may find more detailed directions to what you seek. His grave is hidden beneath the Hall of the Old Guard in Tyfaris"

I have browsed trough your librairies and searched for a way to fullfill my queste without disturbing you, but allas, I fear that Gaia wishes to involve you all, and I pray that, in your eternal wisdom, you will.

*bows down*

[AcidK]

Originally Posted by Planetkiller II

Chaos
Cid left the cavern as hastily as possible, continuing to follow his insticts down further into the bowels of the mines. The darkness was almost absolute now, but the necromancer's eyes were uncaring. His lenses began to glow a deep red as they adjusted to the low light, but suddenly he turned into a passageway light by soft artificial light. Cid quickly ducked back into the darkened side passage he'd come from as his eyes refocused. There shouldn't be anything man made this deep. Even the miners would never have come down here, where the arachnoids nested. The fibres would be clogged with small creatures caught up in them and useless. Cid peered round the corner, and upon finding it empty, walked slowly into it. Someone had linked up some standard spotlights and layed down some walkways. The tunnel looked artificially rounded too. A lot of effort had gone into making this place habitable again. Cid decided to find out why, moving quietly along, Little Measter at his heels. The passage opened up to a ledge, overlooking a pit. The pit was a hive of activity, dwarves running about with pickaxes and shovels. In the bottom of the area was a perfectly rounded egg-like structure, that appeared to be what the dwarves were digging out. As one digger accidentally hit the obsidian-black egg, another lightning bolt like the one Cid had seen much easier blasted out of its top and lanced upwards, flaming the unfortunate squat as it did so. As its fellows rushed in to see what happened, CId realised that he must be at the bottom of the shaft that he had found when he first entered the caverns.

*Cid was unsure what he was to do at this point, mostly he was concentrating on getting down to the bottom, not realising dwarves would dare try to dig out one of those araknid creatures' eggs, especially when they were more or less surrounded by them. Cid decided it was best to stick to whatever darkness he could find and stay out of sight from the dwarves, moving around to see if anything else was down here or why the dwarves were trying to dig out this egg.*

[Ur_Quan]

OOC- This is just to let you know that I haven't left the thread and still intend to reply (it's already mostly done, but I still need to finish up on it). Sorry for the delay. -OOC

[Spritely Zombie]

"Looks like the powers that be, don't want me learning everything on my first day of the job."

Gokan grins returns the book to the case, carefully puts everything else back where it belongs. And nonchalently strolls out of the library past the concerned-looking librarian. He nods and smiles as he passes. Then heads purposefully towards the council chamber.

[Ur_Quan]

OOC- Sorry I took so long, but here it is; my post. -OOC

Tex was a little puzzled by the conversation he had just overheard. Everything had pretty much seemed to be straight-forward up this point; get in, get key, get out, save the world but don't tell anybody about it. Yet it looked as if these two knew more about what was happening. And something had to be happening if a Slyph was to come down here voluntarily. They had also spoken of some being that got free and would be coming here. Tex couldn't of course be sure, but he guessed that they were talking about the key's guardian; Technosis. He had a feeling that these two could provide him with some valuable information regarding the events that would lead to the ultimate catastrophe that would happen in a couple of hours. However, he hadn't come here for information, he had come for The Key of Technology and he didn't plan on leaving with out it.

Tex figured that he'd better hurry and come up with a plan to get the key before Technosis would be able to lay claim to it, because that'd surely complicate things. Obviously, he needed to get into the vault to get the key, so it made sense to Tex to have a look at The Vault before thinking up ways to get in. He walked back to sign that had said 'The Vault' and followed what was basically a long, curved corridor with an occasional side room. As he came to the end of the corridor, he saw a big heavy door and a sign over it saying 'The Vault'. On either side of the door was a guard. As he stood there thinking, a researcher in a bio-hazard suit walked past him, approaching The Vault. Tex saw the man take off a glove and press his thumb against a controlscreen on the sidewall. The heavy door slid open and the man walked in, after which the door closed immediately and soundlessly. He cursed in silence. He wouldn't be able to apply Pinky to a door that used bionic personal identification marks.

Tex pondered this problem for while as the door opened again and out walked another man in a bio-hazard suit and in one hand he was carrying what looked like a small metal briefcase. "What comes out, must've gone in first.", he reasoned and he walked about 100 meters back through the corridor to one of the side rooms he had seen on his way to The Vault. A sign said 'Toilets'. He went to check if they were empty. They were. Then he walked into the doorpost, waiting for the man with the metal briefcase to come round the bend, hoping that no one else happened to be coming from the other direction. Several seconds later, the guy came into view and as he walked past the toilets, Tex, said: "Hey you! Over here! Come in and give me a hand, will you?" The guy looked into the direction of the toilets, where the voice seemed to be coming from, but as he saw nothing, he decided to walk in. He put down the case and asked: "I don't see you. Where are you?" "Over here. Remove your helmet." Without objection, the guy complied and as he turned around to scout the area, Tex decloaked and punched the guy in the face. He fell to the floor unconscious and Tex quickly dragged him into one of the spacious toilet cubicles and locked the door. There he pulled off the guy's bio-hazard suit as well as his white labcoat and nametag. Then, he unsheated his Techno-katana and carefully cut a thin slice from the inner side of the scientist's thumb. He didn't like it, but he needed it for the fingerprint identification later on. He tore some rags off the guard's uniform he was still wearing over his own clothes and used them to stop the bleeding on the researcher's thumb. Despite being a thief and living on the darker side of society, Tex wasn't a cruel man and he didn't want to cause any suffering that could be prevented. Tex then discarded his guard uniform, put on the scientist's labcoat and hoisted himself into the bio-hazard suit. He cleaned the blood from the slice of thumb and pressed it against his own thumb until it stuck. Next, he put on the suit's helmet, grabbed the briefcase and walked back to The Vault. He casually approached the guards, walked over to the controlscreen, removed the glove from his hand, pressed it against the scanner and prayed that it would open the heavy door.

Garion pulled his head back into the earth, and sat there for a moment. "That relic must be one of the key's. Not that many regular archeoligists employ armed guards, and esspesially not a small army. And he mentioned this freya again, and Loki. I seem to remember reading that they were some ancint gods somewhere on earth. Time to find out who theese would be archeologists are." Garion peeked out to make sure the dwarfes were gone, then moved out to follow them down deeper into the mine. Hopefully they would lead him to Freya and Loki. As he got close enough to te dwarfes to see them again he readied his staf that he always caried around. Usaly he had it slung over his back in a crude sheete. He surpressed the faint glow comming frome the stone in the middle of the staff so as not to attract too much unwanted attention as he snuk down the dark mine.

[Hewitt]

Originally Posted by Planetkiller II

Fire
"Who knows Miss Hewitt. However I suspect we may see stranger things before the day is done, if these instructions are any indication."

Warder strode from the room and down the steps without looking back, however when he came to the hover limo he stopped to wait for Jasmine. The Will was talking to her again by that point.

Why exactly do you want to use that clanking piece of human-tech. I can teleport you both by fire a short way, to somewhere that you can use a more effective means of transport.

It didn't bother to wait for permission. Firey tendrils began to unfurl from the page, and wrap themselves around the two, creeping up their clothing without burning. At the moment that they became entirely surrounded by flame, there was a sense of rushing and a momentary sense of rushing and the briefest glimpse of something... wrong. Then it was gone, and they appeared on the platform of Exodus Station as if they had always been there. People rushed past, dashing into the energy powered teleporters that would take them to the corresponding destinations on other worlds.

"Despite this being our destination if we had used normal transport, I still don't know how we can get through customs easily. Teleporter time usually gets booked a few months ahead. Got any ideas?"

*Jasmine, somewhat dazed from the Draco will's version of teleporting through time and space took a few seconds to take in just where they now were and what was just said. When she did, she was not very pleased.*

"Oh peachy. Dumped in the middle of transit-central with no tele-pass or passports, I'd say we have about thirty seconds before some guard comes snooping for ID."

*Jasmine was becoming increasingly uncomfortable in the busy station. Darting looks around the crowded space, she let her constant annoyance with the animated piece of wrinkled parchment slip for the moment as she grew more concerned with a run in with exodus security - as a half dragon monster even with a pass she could expect some trouble.*

"This is not good."

*Slowly Jas felt a few old instincts begin to kick in, along with long repressed urges. In her much maligned youth Hewitt had made a living out of raiding other peoples pockets. Back then she didn't know what she knew now, what hardship her seemingly pitiful acts really caused to those she stole from, how her envy blinded her sense of reality... and all that morality kind of stuff that her father had spent much time teaching her. Even in the bitterest of her recent years Jas turned from taking from innocents and ever since the death of Paul it had been harder still.

So Jasmine did not enjoy the prospect of having to 'stretch old muscles', even if it was to help save the universe.*

"I guess I'm to go 'collect' us some passports and ID yeah?"

*So Jasmine began searching for a couple of adequent marks. But a thought occured to her and she thought of the parchment. What if she didn't need to pinch clearance after all? The Draco Will could conjurer up the required papers couldn't it?*

The thing has been dormant for centuries. What does it know of passports? Although it did know to bring us to the station...

*Ideas continued to flow through her mind as she noticed a couple by a nearby news stand seemingly excited about their impending interplanetry trip.*

Ok, so what if the will doesn't know about modern security requirements? It should be able to disguise us somehow if I were to pick a few papers from some unsuspecting tourists right? After all I don't see anyone else here with my rare 'skin condition'... hmm....

*Her eyes came across one of the teleporters, she watched as people darted from all over the place only to disappear in the faint blue light.*

Bugger it. I could just grab warder here and dive head first into the portal for Saturn. I'm pretty sure that if we're quick enough we won't have to kill anyone... no, no, no....

*Jasmine continued to ponder what to do forgetting that the sentient parchment could read every single one of them, insults and all.*

[Planetkiller II]

Nature
The council began to speak in turn, ending each other's sentances in a disconcerting fashion.

"We know of this device..."

"... you speak of."

"For we are already..."

"... more involved than you suspect."

"Once we were..."

"... mere mortals."

"Now though..."

"...we are the minions of Asgadra."

"We cannot allow the key to be taken..."

"... the risks are too high."

"Thus we have... "

"... the test."

The twelve council members stood from their thrones, old bones and joints creaking. Arms outstretched, they began to recite words that seemed somehow familiar to Rofellos, but nothing he could recognise, or even say out loud. The plinth in the centre of the throne room glowed white for a moment, and then began to crack. The cracks spread, and the pillar started to decsend into the floor, each section divided by the cracks dropping at a different speed. After a few moments, it stopped, having reached the floor. The pillar had become a set of uneven steps openning into the darkness below. The council sat down as one and in a crackle of magical lightning, dissappeared, leaving only faint words said by all twelve at once hanging in the air.

"Take the test, mage, then we shall see..."


Chaos
As Cid moved closer, he realised that the thing being dug out was not actually an egg at all, merely in the shape of one. From the way the light caught the pitted surface, it appeared to be made of some form of metal. The dwarves had removed their unfortunate fellow to some other place, and simply continued with the work, but Cid suddenly noticed something odd about them. He had seen their white beards, and simply assumed that they were older, more senior dwarves. However, now he looked closely, it appeared that their beards weren't even made of hair at all, instead they crackled with a white electrical light. Another look revealed that their eyes had no pupils, just whites. These were no ordinary dwarves. Cid continued to watch, but at that moment, the squats all stopped work and looked up. Cid flattened himself further to the floor as he followed their gaze. At a ledge slightly above the pit, a white haired man stood tall, holding an ornate metal staff. The dwarves all bowed low and began to chant.

"Coen! Coen! Coen!"

The man motioned with a hand for his servants to quiet, then fluidly, like it was the easiest thing in the world, he jumped off the ledge, landing lightly in the pit. A dwarf ran up to him, offering a flowing leather coat, old but covered in sigils and runes. Cid recognised it as a mage's cloak.

"So, it is true my Lighting Dwarves, you have found it. I almost couldn't believe Thor chose to lock it away, but here is the proof. After so long it is within grasp. Time to crack the egg I think."

Cid felt a gathering of power in the air, like the low hum of an electric fence, then the mage known as Coen's staff began to glow and crackle with lighting energy. A bolt leapt from its tip and hit the apex of the egg. The bolt did not fade away or get absorbed, but began to spread slowly across the dark obsidian surface. Then, a low moan rent forth, seemingly from inside the stone...


Magic
The librarian, Arcana hurried past Gokan has he left, obviously anxious about the contents of the vault. The stone door ground shut behind him. Perhaps if Gokan had accidentally left any evidence of his readings, the aging librarian would think that it was just a product of the strange magic he had seen. Still, wouldn't do to stick around, there was work to be done. Gokan wound his way around the massive bookshelves, attempting to find the correct path to the council chamber. The library itself seemed to have been planned by a madman, so difficult was it to find your way around. Finally he found the corridor to the chamber, lined with marble pillars. The place seemed more empty than usual, as if normally there were other people here. Gokan walked towards the great wooden doors where he had seen the light escape from in his mind's eye, but was met with the sprite official that had frustrated Rofellos earlier. Without troops to back him up he wasn't much of an obstacle anymore, but flew around in an annoying fashion.

"You cannot go in, don't even ask. Not to mention that the council is in session, they even have an audience to complete, despite my better judgement. Thus, I cannot let you go inside."


Technology
It seemed for a moment as if the makeshift thumbprint would not work, but given a few seconds to think about it, the computer tasked with reading the prints decided that it was indeed that of the worker who had left only a minute before. The Vault door opened, locks unlatching with quiet clanks inside the wall. The entire thick metal door slid to the side, allowing him access. Tex took a couple of steps forward, and the door shut behind him. Having not been able to see through the door, he had not been able to tell what was on the other side. He found himself standing in a large empty room with a grid on the floor. A computerised voice began to speak, just as two flying guard drones jetted out of concealed hatches in the walls. The drones came down to eye level, extending a camera and swab-pad for DNA recognition.

"DNA and facial recognition required. If not provided within twenty seconds, Sentinel Defence System will activate. Termination of unauthorised personel has been legitimised. This is your only warning."

As if to emphasise this, the drones poped out machine guns mounted on robot arms, training them in Tex's direction.


Earth
The dwarves weren't particularly difficult to follow. They weren't very attentive, and their loud conversation enabled Garion to track them easily. The tunnels snaked about under the station, and it was hard to keep his bearings, but he, being a Golem could work out at least vaguely where he was when underground. Suddenly, the voices and footsteps came to a halt a little way ahead. Garion peaked around with both his eyes and ears, finding a small encampment. The gear set up there looked like it had been put there for a fairly long stay. As well as food and water dispensors, there was archeological equipment and sensors. Garion even saw several beds, designed to be able to be deployed in an instant. The dwarves had stopped here to listen to a video message that had obviously been waiting for them to get back before playing. The screen showed the face of a young woman, which from the way the dwarves were looking at her, could well be the Freya they had been talking about.

"I assume there's nothing to report at your end, but even if there it will have to wait. The dig site has been located, and we're moving in. You should report to Loki at the location I'm about to send you. Be prepared to fight, this will not be the picnic you've been used to recently."

The screen changed to a plan of the mines with a single blinking dot indicating where the mercenaries were meant to go.


Fire
I may have been dormant for a long time, but that doesn't mean I'm ignorant. The magical fountains that power Exodus have existed forever, only recently have these... regulations come into effect.

The will stopped... speaking for a moment, as if thinking.

While I cannot conjure papers for you Jasmine Hewitt, you have given me an idea. I can BECOME the documents, at least for a short time.

There was a crackling of paper, as the seal on the Will dissappeared and the page rolled up of its own accord, flapping like a released blind in a cartoon. A second later it unfurled again in the form of a small booklet, official looking stamps inside, including one that looked suspiciously like the wax dragon seal from the Will's original form.

I apologise, but I cannot become two papers. Thus, you are now Mr. and Mrs. Hewitt. I'm sure you'll adapt.

That piece of paper truely was exasperating.

[Zappa Tenderlea]

questioning, Roffellos took the steps leading down, knowing that there was no more need, nor use for words at this point in time... exept maybe these...

I accept your challenge.

[AcidK]

I will do my post in full later on

I better get down there. If they want the dwarfs to ready themselves for fight I better not disapoint them. And more importantly they'll most likely be guarding something important hopefully the only thing important enough to deserve all this attention is a key.
Garion waited a little before following the dwarfs. He stayed a little further back then normaly since he knew where they were going more or less.
In his head his thoughts were raceing, trying to figure out what was the best way to knok out theese small creatures. He figured the best way would probly be to use his staff almost like a paddle and knok them on the head.

[AcidK]

Originally Posted by Planetkiller II

Chaos
As Cid moved closer, he realised that the thing being dug out was not actually an egg at all, merely in the shape of one. From the way the light caught the pitted surface, it appeared to be made of some form of metal. The dwarves had removed their unfortunate fellow to some other place, and simply continued with the work, but Cid suddenly noticed something odd about them. He had seen their white beards, and simply assumed that they were older, more senior dwarves. However, now he looked closely, it appeared that their beards weren't even made of hair at all, instead they crackled with a white electrical light. Another look revealed that their eyes had no pupils, just whites. These were no ordinary dwarves. Cid continued to watch, but at that moment, the squats all stopped work and looked up. Cid flattened himself further to the floor as he followed their gaze. At a ledge slightly above the pit, a white haired man stood tall, holding an ornate metal staff. The dwarves all bowed low and began to chant.

"Coen! Coen! Coen!"

The man motioned with a hand for his servants to quiet, then fluidly, like it was the easiest thing in the world, he jumped off the ledge, landing lightly in the pit. A dwarf ran up to him, offering a flowing leather coat, old but covered in sigils and runes. Cid recognised it as a mage's cloak.

"So, it is true my Lighting Dwarves, you have found it. I almost couldn't believe Thor chose to lock it away, but here is the proof. After so long it is within grasp. Time to crack the egg I think."

Cid felt a gathering of power in the air, like the low hum of an electric fence, then the mage known as Coen's staff began to glow and crackle with lighting energy. A bolt leapt from its tip and hit the apex of the egg. The bolt did not fade away or get absorbed, but began to spread slowly across the dark obsidian surface. Then, a low moan rent forth, seemingly from inside the stone...

*Cid felt as if this was not the time or place to be in the chamber. This Coen seemed to have great power in what he was now calling the Lightning Caves of Mars. Cid wasn't the best against Lightning, he prefered to be against something less based on energy. Cid did not want to waste time to see what was inside the egg, but at the same time he definatly did not want to run a suicide attack into a man he knows nothing of as well as a man that could be a lot more powerful than himself and Little Measter put together.*

*Cid then remembered what the book in the Chaotic Temple said: They will meet Ragnarok on Devil's Crown. He began to wonder if this place was Devil's Crown and hoped that he wasn't going to come face to face with Ragnorak. At least he knew where to start next he is shifted to the first of the twelve hours. Here, in the middle of this area, to find this Coen and to stop him releasing whatever Thor chose to hide away. Cid would have guessed that even Hades would have chosen the same decision.*

[Spritely Zombie]

Gokan stood there for a moment, peering first at the sprite, and then at the giant ornate doors into the council chamber. Putting his hands upon the door he traced the ancient arcane writings deeply engraved upon them. Finally he took a deep breath and stepped away from the doors. He smiled at the sprite. Walked over to the wall by the door and proceeded to lean nonchalently against it.

The sprite continued to fly around a look of puzzlement upon it's face.

"Tell me." Gokan said, "Did anything strange come out of these doors not more than a few minutes ago?"

[Ur_Quan]

It's about time I wrote a reply for this thread. I'll try doing it tonight.

<ooc>You better getting bored waiting.</ooc>

[Ur_Quan]

Tex gulped as he looked at the machine guns. He hadn't counted on this. As he heard the sentinels count down the seconds, his brains worked overtime to come up with a plan. It didn't look like there was any elegant way out of this and brute force seemed to be his only option. He considered his chances against the sentinels. He could take out one of them, but then the other one was likely to attack and he wouldn't be able to dodge all the bullets from that machine gun, even when he'd enable his reactiontime/speed enchancement.

Then a thought struck him; Pinky! Pinky had the ability to disrupt certain electronic circuits. Perhaps Pinky could disrupt the sentinels long enough for him to take them both out. He didn't know what would happen if the sentinels' sensors were disrupted. There might be an alarm if the disruption lasted long enough, but he doubt they would go beserk and fire blindly at their surroundings. The risk of hitting any critical systems would be enormous in a place like this.

Judging by the sentinel's countdown, Tex had only 10 seconds left. He concentrated on his plan and took a deep breath as he activated his reactiontime/speed enhancement. Then he activated Pinky's jamming ability and made a quick sidewards roll, just in case he was wrong and the sentinels would fire blindly. He drew his Techno Katana and swiftly put an end to sentinel number one. As it went down, he noticed that the other one was still confused as to what was happening to it. With a slash from his katana, Tex put it out his misery. He couldn't hear any alarms, but for all he knew, it could be a silent alarm. Whatever the case would turn out to be, Tex figured he didn't have much time left to obtain the Key of Technology. He deactivated Pinky and his own enhancement and then went on deeper into The Vault.

[No Dachi]

omg!

Where on earth is my character? Still where he was before?

[Ur_Quan]

He wasn't anywhere on earth, if I remember correctly. Try Jupiter.

[Planetkiller II]

Nature
The stairs led downward into the blackness, deeper than had Rofellos had ever expected them too. It was nearly five minutes before he reached the bottom, and the light was almost gone. He felt about for a short while straining to see in the gloom while his eyes adjusted. He took a step forward, whereupon his foot came into contact with water with a loud splash that echoed in the silence. Below the last step, there was water flowing slowly past. Not particularly deep, just up to the ankles, but enough to remind Rofellos that it was entirely likely these tunnels were part of the sewer system. The more his eyes dillated to see in the low light, the more correct this analysis seemed, since the walls were covered with slime and mould. He strode slowly but confidently forward, splashing through the dark water. From somewhere in the distance, a woman's voice called out, haunting its way through the passages to Rofellos' ears.

"This way... come to me..."

A few more steps and he reached a fork in the tunnel. From what he could see down both passages, they again forked only a short way down them. It looked like he was in the middle of a labyrinth.


Earth
This journey was just as uninteresting as the last, except this time, the dwarves had stopped talking and looked much more grim. They were moving with purpose now, cradling their weapons and checking ammo counters. Garion was just about ready to bash them over the head (though he'd have had to hit them hard, Dwarf skulls were very tough, so as to resist possible cave ins), when the tunnel branched out once more. In the cave ahead, a squadron of other mercenaries, some other dwarves, some humans, faeries and even an orkiform or two stood or sat about, checking weapons and lounging about. The two he'd been following fell in with their compatriots. At that moment, a man, or what at first glance seemed to be a man strode out in front of the crowd. He cleared his throat and silence fell.

"Assembled species. Some of you have met me, some have not. I am Loki, and tonight you will earn your money. Your leaders may not have told you this, but there are people down in these mines that we want eliminated. They are not normal beings, for they are empowered by magic. We need you to rid Mars of these beings. You will of course be paid well, the value which you thought was to be paid for your guarding services. Tonight there will be a battle down here, and the victor will achieve rewards. Your assignments should be coming in to your DataMates now."

The mercenaries began looking up information on their palm assistants.


Chaos
The power began to grow, striking repeatedly along the surface of the egg more and more vigourously. The noise from within rose, as the black shine of it began to glow an electric yellow-white. As the lightning bolts reached a crashing creshendo, the egg exploded, blasting white light in all directions. Momentarily blinded, Cid covered his eyes, trying to adapt as quickly as possible to see through the sea of radiance. Little Measter, as a demonic familiar, was able to change far more quickly to the situation. Cid heard him begin to growl and snarl in the direction of whatever had been released, moments before he was able to see it. Peering through his peeling fingers, his first thought was that the light had not yet stopped. But as his eyes continued to focus, he realised that something had taken its place. A figure, humanoid but by no means human stood four metres tall in place of the egg, composed entirely of crackling power. Sparks flew from its jagged edges, striking the ground and dancing about the cave. A mouth, that seemed to be made of black lightning, cut across its head shaped protrusion, and two red eyes bored down at the assembled dwarves and Coen. Coen, for his part, was smiling.

"Excellent. Just as it should be. Now, Lightning Elemental, know that I Coen have released you. I do not expect to control you, for you cannot be controlled. But I feel that you still owe me a debt, one that could be repaid in destruction, which I'm sure you'll be happy to oblige in..."


Magic
The official's face fell.

"You saw that did you... Mage, it was the Dancing of Magicflies, the energies released when the council is unsealed from their deep meditation. The power of it this time though... their powers have grown very strong during their last deliberation. There may be something wrong... But there's nothing that can be done, I am merely a weak mage, capable only of conjuring tricks. Who knows what kind of damage those energies did. With that kind of power it could have killed hundreds or done nothing at all, there's simply no way to tell..."

The official was rambling, and continued to do so, getting more and more flustered with each reiteration of an earlier point.


Technology
The computerised voice continued, emotionless and as if Tex had not just jammed then slashed up two of its servants. The bits of the aforementioned sentinels clattered to the ground, circuitboards and parts spilling of onto the floor. Tex was rather satisfied with the destruction he'd managed to cause them.

"There appears to be an error with the sentinel's sensor systems. Please remain where you are until fresh units are in position. Medium level security measures are active until identifaction can be completed."

It was then Tex noticed that across the room was another heavy door, with a datapad lock on it. Above the door were the words 'The Vault, Level 2'. It seemed there could well be more security the deeper you got. Perhaps excessive security, but perhaps not. The tiles in front of Tex began glow, either black or white. Every second or so the pattern changing in a seemingly random fashion. This probably wasn't as inocuous as it seemed, but there wasn't much time to test things, since the hatches that the sentries had come from were opening again.

[Zappa Tenderlea]

The stairs led downward into the blackness, deeper than had Rofellos had ever expected them too. It was nearly five minutes before he reached the bottom, and the light was almost gone. He felt about for a short while straining to see in the gloom while his eyes adjusted. He took a step forward, whereupon his foot came into contact with water with a loud splash that echoed in the silence. Below the last step, there was water flowing slowly past. Not particularly deep, just up to the ankles, but enough to remind Rofellos that it was entirely likely these tunnels were part of the sewer system. The more his eyes dillated to see in the low light, the more correct this analysis seemed, since the walls were covered with slime and mould. He strode slowly but confidently forward, splashing through the dark water. From somewhere in the distance, a woman's voice called out, haunting its way through the passages to Rofellos' ears.

"This way... come to me..."

A few more steps and he reached a fork in the tunnel. From what he could see down both passages, they again forked only a short way down them. It looked like he was in the middle of a labyrinth.

taking some time to calculate where he was compared to groundlevel, and where the burialground was, Roffelos tried getting his bearings, and went into the passageway that seemed to go into the right direction to reach the Shrine, hoping he would be able to get there trough this maze of corridors

[Planetkiller II]

All done.

[AcidK]

*Cid still waited, hoping the lightning elemental will leave Coen in the road to destruction so Cid could deal with Coen personally without a 4 metre tall lightning elemental blocking his path. Cid did not want to come face to face with elementals, mostly because they were virtually indestructable if you don't have the right means to take them down. Cid did not really have anything against elementals because they were classed as magical beasts, and that means to Cid as 'not neccessarily alive'.*

*At least Cid knew what he was going to do when he is pushed back 12 hours... Take out this Coen figure before the Elemental is released, at least he would be happy enough to not let one of the twelve elementals roaming free.*

Garion looked around trying to spot some unattentive person. It would be nice to know what it sayd on those palm assistants. Hopefuly Loki hadn't been talking about him. Fighting usaly went better when the other person didn't know about him. After quickly scaning the room for the best candidate he snuk into the wall and reemerged right behind the unsuspecting poor fellow and deliverd a full force blow with his staff to the side of his neck hoping to both break his neck and wind pipe so he wouldent scream.

[Spritely Zombie]

Gokan remains leaning upon the wall.

"So they... It... Serves no intelligent purpose? It is merely a random discharge of magical energies?"

Gokan found himself tracing the familiar lines of his gauntlets. Lines, of gold, jade, electrum and other materials, both mundane and arcane criss-crossed across them, small enchanted gems set at various key locations siphoned off and routed energies from and to his body.

"And what would be a likely result of this.... Dance of the Mageflies, striking an individual," he tapped himself lightly upon his chest. "Such as myself?"

[Ur_Quan]

OOC- Sorry for taking such a long time to reply again (it seems to be a habit of mine ). I hope you like the post. (Personally I'm not too happy with how I open that lock, but I couldn't think of anything better.) -OOC

Tex frowned as he looked at the ever changing changing patterns of glowing tiles. "What's next; disco balls lowering themselves from the ceiling?" He briefly glanced up at the ceiling, just to check, before focussing back on the floor. He'd never seen anything like this before and even though it didn't look very dangerous, he had a feeling that if he wasn't careful, he wouldn't see something like this ever again, or anything else, for that matter. He couldn't discern any immediate pattern in the way the tiles lighted up. He decided to do a little test.

Next to his feet lay a piece of circuitry from the sentinels he had destroyed. He picked it up and broke it in half. Then he experimentally threw one half on a small patch of white tiles. As the piece of debris touched the white tiles, there was a fizzling sound as if a match were lit and then the scrap just melted. "Alright, so black must be safe," he thought as he casually tossed the other half of the circuitry board away. It happened to land on a black tile and Tex watched as the thing melted in exactly the same way as happened on the white tiles. Tex was momentarily puzzled as well as annoyed. When the white tiles turned out to be dangerous, he had automatically assumed that the black ones were safe. Why had he done that? It wasn't like him at all to assume anything. People that assumed too much usually didn't live very long, especially people in the thieving kind of profession.

Tex looked sideways at the doors where the new sentinels would be coming from. They were already half open. He had to come up with something very quickly or his adventure would end here. He looked down at the floor again and started to think. "What was the point in having 2 different tiles when they both did the same thing?" As his mind raced to come up with a way to tackle this problem, his eyes focussed on a point that was several inches below the floor and quite suddenly he became aware of some sort of pattern. From this "point of view" it looked like there was a path outlined against a background of flickering lights. Tex remembered that, as a child, he'd had a book with these colourful pictures in it that didn't look like anything at all, but when you looked at them for a long enough time, you could see that there was some sort of three dimensional picture coming out against the background of the original picture. This floor was exactly the same thing, only this time, the picture was a path, a safe path! He quickly remembered his earlier mistake, picked up another piece of circuitry, focussed his eyes several inches below the floor so that the path became 'visible' again and tossed the piece of junk on what he believed to be the safe path. Absolutely nothing happened. Satisfied with the result, Tex quickly made his way to the other side of the room along the path.

Once he was on the other side, Tex looked at the heavy doors. They looked like they wouldn't budge even if you brought a tank with you. The lock, however, happened to be an xs11 keypadlock. Although a pretty sophisticated lock, they were rather common practice in the technology industry and as of such Tex had considerable experience with them. He had actually brought one home once, to study it. He'd found out that, although the lock was impossible to hack, there was a small flaw in its design. In order to make the lock 'brutality proof', they had reinforced parts of the lock's interior with strategically placed strips of some metal alloy. Of course you couldn't see it from the outside, but one such strip happened to be exactly in between the lock's kathode and the anode and Tex had found out that if a strong enough electric field was applied to the device, there would be an induced charge on the metal strip. If the electric field also happened to have a specific frequency, there would be a resonant effect that kept increasing the induced charge until it became too much and then there would flow a short but strong enough current from the anode to the kathode through the metal strip, thus making the lock think that you had entered the code correctly and opening the door. The real beauty was of this technique was the fact that it didn't leave any marks or damaged the lock in any way, ensured that no one ever found out how he'd done it and they just assumed he must've gotten hold of the actual code somewhere.

Tex set Pinky to full power and to what he remembered as being more or less the correct frequency. Ten seconds later there was a small bang inside the device and the huge doors slid open and closed behind him just as the new sentinels were coming from their hatches.

[Planetkiller II]

Nature
"The Old Ways are not safe... come to me...."

The woman's voice was back again, sounding younger now, almost childlike. Though he couldn't explain it, Rofellos also thought he hear a child's soft peels of laughter over the voice, but the sound was no not actually there. He strode on, the map held foremost in his mind. Oddly, the passageways did not seem to be quite as his map said. Perhaps the map was simply old, or incomplete, but Rofellos had a sneaking suspicion that the walls were shifting, even as he walked past them. He moved quicker, hoping to outpace the sliding of stone that was taking place just beyond his peripheral vision. It did not help though, all it did was run him into a dead end faster. He whirled about, intending to run back the way he had came, but found that the single passge he had come from had become two. From one of them, the voice called once more.

"I said they were not safe! I cannot help you... NO, GET BACK!"

The silent laughing innocence was gone, replaced by a single, long scream, and out loud, an earsplitting, deafeningly deep roar.


Chaos
Cid's musings were interupted as the creature's slow mind worked up to an answer. A low crackling rumble came forth as the elemental's mouth like hole opened, sparks flying across the apature. It spoke a single, charged word.

"YEEEESSSS!"

More lightning bolts flew from the surface of the elemental, one blasting another unfortunate dwarf. It began to cackle as the electrical storm flared up, the bolts forming into one singular fork, nearly a beam upwards. The lightning blasted up the shaft and slammed into the roof of the mine, smashing a massive hole in it and raining red rock and dirt down on the assembled crowd. The elemental, still laughing, seemed to pull itself into the upward striking bolt, and surged along it, up into the open sky. Though previously only overcast, storm clouds were already gathering in what Cid could see of the sky through the hole. He didn't know whether it was the doing of the elemental, or if it was merely an omen. It didn't really matter, either way that thing was lose, and wreaking havoc on an unsupecting Mars. Coen seemed happy, and was talking to another of his dwarves who had just ran in.

"So, they're on the move are they? Well, let them come. With the Elemental providing a distraction above, we can smash Freya and Loki below. So be it."


Earth
Garion found a suitable target with relative ease. A sprite of all things, standing alone next to a wall near one of the tunnels into the cavern. The being's weak neck at the best of times was smashed easily by Garion's powerful blow. Quickly then, he removed the body before he could be noticed by the milling crowd. As soon as he was out of visual range, Garion took up the sprite's DataMate, scanning the information already on the screen. It looked like the entire force of mercenaries was being deployed into the deeper tunnels. The notes told them to be prepared to fight other dwarves as well as magic. Interestingly, it was also made very clear that if anyone with large ammounts of power was encountered, Freya and Loki were to be sent for at once. Garion idlely flipped through the remaining information, discovering detailed maps of the caverns, which would come in useful, as well as a tracer program designed to keep track of all the mercenaries and where they were supposed to be. On this program, he saw that the cavern was now emptying, with all the mercenaries moving out either to armouries to get tooled up, or to their respective posts. It looked like they didn't mind having to fight a battle. A small text alert appeared in the DataMate's corner: Message Alert. Garion opened it, finding that he (or rather the sprite he had killed) was being ordered to his post. Now he just had to decide what to do about it, before the mercenaries caught on that the sprite in question was no longer around.


Magic
"Well, I would not say that they serve no intelligent purpose. They are said to be seekers of power, one day showing us the mage with the power to take Aerie's place. It is almost certainly mere legend though, for no one has been found by the Mageflies to date. Still, some of us still hope that the council's power will still be able to bring about a new age."

From behind him, Baldur heard the crashing of armoured feet, as burly elf guards, in the golden metal of the elite regiment swiftly marched up, halting at the doors. The official turned sadly to them.

"It's no use Captain, I could not stop him. THe doors have fully sealed themselves after the Mageflies broke loose. None but an extremely powerful mage could interupt this interview now. All we can do is await what they decide to do with the Nature mage who so calously intruded upon them."

The largest of the guards, obviously the Captain, nodded, and signalled for his men to stand to attention around the doors, waiting to see what would emerge.


Technology
With that obstacle out of the way, Tex was free to look around Level 2 of The Vault. The AI was back again, this time more insistent.

"While you appear to have the correct security access, you cannot be allowed to proceed further without full identification. Side vaults closing. IR Labyrinth active."

Tex noticed that the large square room he'd entered was much like the first, only this time around the walls were various compartments, containing a variety of devices and weapons. They were already closing up, as the computer had said they would. Another thing he noticed was that several red light dots around the edge of the room had flickered on. Lastly, he saw that between him and the door to Level 3 ( the final security level, he hoped) sentinels were being raised from hatches in the floor. This time, they were some kind of walker, in vaguel human form. Their skeletons gleamed an eeir silver as they pointed gun shaped arms in Tex's direction, but not opening fire yet. They advanced, paying no heed to the red lights, focused only upon identifying the intruder.

[Zappa Tenderlea]

angered without knowing why, Rofellos responded to the roar with a roar of his own, then started sprinting towards the sound again

[AcidK]

*Cid had enough of this charade as he snaked his way towards Coen. He raised his staff as he came close to Coen and his eyes began to flare a little more red in the colour. Cid would have thought Coen to be deprived of energy after calling the Elemental, at least Cid could practice hurting Coen or take his staff before the 12-hour reset. Cid was not the first to do a suprise dive, Little Measter was as it suddenly launched a Chaotic Moon as Cid himself launched slow onto Coen. The half-cresent wave of dark demonic energies hit the dwarves around Coen as well as Coen himself.*

*It was at this point that Little Measter cast beserk, making him go mental and his prime target was Coen and any dwarf that would even try to approach his feild of veiw. Cid simply energised his hands chaotically, also energising the staff with it, and began to pummel dwarves out of his way as he charged towards Coen.*

[Planetkiller II]

All done.

Garion grabbed the sprite and moved into the rock wall where he left the
dead body before he went back out frome the wall. He then waited a little
while before moving towards the sprite's post. As he moved he made sure to
stay as far away from anyone as possible, quikly killing and conseeling anyone
standing alone but avoiding those who he wouldent be able to kill without them
sounding an alarm. For every one of the unfortunate souls that he killed he
took a new DataMate and buried the old one with the body. This way he
moved deeper and deeper into the cavers figuring that whatever he was
looking at would most likely be at the bottom, or that he might find some sign
of it on one of the DataMates.

[Hewitt]

ooc: bugger keep forgetting this thread not that I haven't been distracted what with trying to get somewhere in life and all... might make a post tommorrow (self-sceduled day off) failing that then don't expect something till late November

[Ur_Quan]

Tex looked at the advancing sentinels. The fact that they had large machine guns instead of arms, made it clear that these things weren't designed to do any cleaning. Well, in a way they were, but they did the sort of cleaning that left a terrible mess once they'd finished. There were two of them and they were heading in his direction, advancing with a steady pace. The rays of red light that were coming from various points in the walls and the ceiling didn't have any apparent effect on them as they moved through them. This suggested that, whatever they were, they probably wouldn't turn him into crisp, like the floortiles on the previous level would have done.

As the sentinels drew closer, Tex decided that he had no alternative but to fight his way across the room. He drew his techno-katana and there was a light humm as the blade sprang to life. Still curious about the red lights, he held out his weapon to the side to interrupt one of the beams. The sentinels responded immediately by pointing their guns, that had hitherto been aimed at Tex, at the point where his sword connected with the ray of light. One of the bots fired a few bullets on a spot on the floor that was directly in front of Tex' sword. Then, the clear sound of the AI voice made another announcement: "Please stay where you are until full identification has been completed. This is your final warning."

"So, the red lights were just a big detection grid," he thought. Tex scoured the area for a way to get past the beams without having to touch them. There wasn't any, the spaces between the beams were simply too narrow. He had no other choice but to fall back on his earlier plan to fight his way through. Tex had seen the swiftness and accuracy with which the sentinels could aim their weapons and so he once more activated his speed enhancement. He waited till they were close enough, and then he suddenly leapt and summersaulted over the first bot, holding out his katana as he went over. As the sword viberated through the sentinel like a hot knife through butter, it was accompanied by sparks as the sword dealt its electro-shock surprise to the vulnerable interior parts of the robot, causing even more damage. There was a clang behind Tex as the the robotic guard was split right down the middle and each of the two halves collided with the floor, displaying its innards.

As he landed on his feet again, Tex didn't turn round to look. Instead he immediately rolled to his right side to dodge the barrage of bullets that the other sentinel was firing at him. Tex had to run as fast as he could, barely being able to keep ahead of the deadly hail that came from the remaining bot. Tex kept running around it in circles, ever spiraling inwards until he eventually came close enough to topple the sentinel's head with a well aimed slash from his katana. This didn't stop the thing from firing, but it did cause the robot to lose its connection with detection grid and as such it started firing wildly in random directions. Tex ducked as the guns flailed past and then he thrust his sword into the robotic guard's back and moved it downwards, cutting through the inner circuitry and putting it out of its misery.

Tex wiped some sweat off his forehead when suddenly the AI voice spoke again: "Warning! Security measures compromised. Secondary defences operational." On both of the walls to his side, hatches opened up and since it is never a good idea to wait and see what happens on such occasions, Tex immediately flung himself out of the way just in time prevent himself from being roast 'n toasted by two large bursts of flame that came from the hatches in the wall. Tex barely had the time to get up as a new set of hatches opened up on his sides. Dreading a second burst flame, he legged it across the room to the door that would lead him to the next area, being only just in time to evade the scorching flames that were blown out of the hatches that continued to open up beside him. When he had finally made it to the door, he was very nearly out of breath, but was pleasantly surprised that the huge door didn't have a locked keypad, but could be opened easily by pressing a normal button. He pressed it and the door opened obediently.

OOC- Yup, I'm late again, but I hope the large post makes up for some of that. -OOC

[Spritely Zombie]

Baldur looked at the intricately carved doors and then to the guards that were standing rigidly to attention around them. He looked at the security desk where a small yet intricate holographic display showed the time.

"The universe really doesn't have time for this." Once again he scanned the surface of the door, noticing the intricate traceries of enchantments placed upon it. "How thick is it?" he asked suddenly.

[No Dachi]

No Dachi looks around, trying to take stock of his situation by examining each of the evil creatures swarming around him in turn, looking for anything he could use to his advantage.

OOC: Or something. Better posts will follow DMing, once I know where I am and all.

[Planetkiller II]

Nature
Rofellos' elven boots splashed loudly in the dirty water as he ran down the shifting-tunnel, but he had decided that it did not matter. It sounded like there was not much time. Now that he was moving purposely towards the voice, the tunnels seemed to be actually helping him. Rofellos couldn't explain it, but it felt like the walls were willing him onwards, wanting his feet to move faster than they already were. Unexpectedly, he ran out into a spacious area, which looked like some kind of automatic treatment works. Sewer water was gushing in from several different stone pipes and various important looking valves and boilers were dotted around. The most striking feature of the place though was not sewer related. On a kind of stone island in the centre, a young girl stood, clad in a white dress with ribbons in her hair. Oddly, Rofellos couldn't actually place her species, but that was not what he was immediately concerned with, for standing over her was a beast almost fifteen metres tall, with black, leathery skin and bone white horns that protruded from and evil, grinning skull. Black flame licked around it's lips, and in one hand it carried a huge, spiked club. Rofellos didn't recognise its species exactly, but he guessed the thing was some kind of troll. He'd never seen one of these before, but the beast seemed intent on the little girl. It raised its club as if to strike, and the little girl screamed once more. Rofellos' ears popped as the scream reverberated, leave the sound of unseen laughter in his ears again. The troll-thing lowered its club and smiled. Rofellos got the impression it hadn't been going to kill the girl. Not yet, anyway...


Chaos
Coen had already turned to walk out of one of the lower entrances to the cavern when Little Measter dove from the ledge, slavering with anticipation at the thought of biting off a few limbs from such a powerfully magical opponent. The chaotic spell-wave smashed into the crowd, sending them flying out of the way, except Coen himself, who raised his staff vertically in front of himself in defence. The chaos splashed around him in a brilliant glare of magic mixing with magic, but Coen remained there unharmed. Measter leapt with supernatural energy towards him, teeth bared. Coen only just managed to move his staff in time to wedge it between the familiar's teeth, and Measter latched on with all the force a demonic beast could muster. While the two mismatched opponents stuggled for the staff, Cid followed his familiar down, blasting lightning dwarves out of the way as he moved forward. Those most seriously injured were obvious to the eye, as their electric hair faded and died, making them look slightly comical. Any true dwarf seeing them would have shunned them on sight. Cid was only a few metres from Coen, when the lightning mage managed to shake off the doglike form of Little Measter, who went spinning into a pair of lightning dwarves. Coen looked Cid up and down.

"A demonic? And what business has Ragnarok here, eh? Speak now, red-eye."


Earth
The route Garion had to take was not an easy one. There were so many mercenaries taking the same route that he constantly had to duck in and out of the walls and earth in order to remain undetected. However, it didn't take him long to reach his destination, since he could bypass the longest winding tunnels and cut corners from the journey with ease. When he finally popped out of the wall at the final location that the DataMate indicated, it was to a huge empty cavern, with passages leading into it from all sides. Garion wondered what possible signifigance the place could have, barren as it was from any obvious worth. He took another look at the map, and noticed that the cavern seemed to be at a focal point of the tunnel network. Tactical signifigance then, they had been planning this it would seem. He also saw a large number of trackers heading in his direction, and decided that the best course of action for now would be to hide. From a vantage point in the rock wall, he saw the mercenaries spill out into the cavern. Flashlights strapped to their weapons created strange patterns in the darkness, and he could hear radio traffic. The large squad began to move across the cavern, pausing only to take position at what little cover the various boulders and rocks offered. Then, from the opposite side of the cave, other beings began to run in. Like dwarves, but certainly not, what with their electrically glowing hair. They too carried weapons, and upon seeing the mercs, began to open fire...


Technology
"Error, error. Intruder should be eliminated. System shows intruder still active. AI codename-Overwatch reports Vault security compromised. Calling security now. All sentinels to active mode."

Tex had arrived in the new room with some trepidation, expecting to find more weapons pointed at him. He had been pleasantly suprised to discover that he was wrong. Unfortunately, between him and the door on the other side was a sea of what looked like some kind of electrically charged liquid, that shimmed and sparked as he watched it. There were also covered alcoves in the walls and ceilings for what Tex guessed by their size would be roller and flyer sentinels respectively. That at least meant that the sentinels must be immune to the gunk, if the roller sentinels could move through it. On the other hand, it seemed that Level 3 was indeed the last security room, for Tex could just about make out the text on the opposite door. It read High Security Workrooms, Overwatch AI Core and Top Security Storage, with arrows pointing in the various directions of the rooms. He could also see a scanner of some form, but he was unsure what its function might be at this kind of range. Well, there was no way to go but forward, Tex thought as he hit the door lock control on his side. Perhaps that would give him an extra few seconds until security arrived.


Magic
"You're thinking in terms of the physical too much. The doors are as thick as you can imagine. As thick as the very fabric of the magical universe. The seals placed upon them could never be broken by a normal being. Legends tell that the Aerie's true heir would have the power, but none have ever been able to do so."

The official suddenly seemed to come to his senses.

"Anyway, what are you still doing here, civillian? The guard is here to deal with this now, so you can just run along."


Light
You'll have a recapy sort of DM shortly
Edit: Ah, Fluffie seems to have done it for me. Thankee

[Zappa Tenderlea]

Who are you two, what are you doing here, tell me!

Rofellos started thinking again, slightly, and tought about what the voices said... nothing is as it seems... who of those 2 was good, who was evil? what were they doing here, if the troll-like figure was indeed bent on destroying the girl, he could have done so ages ago, seeing how they seemed to be the only 2 lifeforms ever to have been down here, next to Rofellos who just arrived, and was dropped in this dungeon by the elven counsil... there had to be something not immediatly obvious, something behind all of it, something he had to find out... maybe that was the test?