ic Belly of the Beast

[RocketLord]

GM

 

"Nothing about this blasted whale is typical, or even natural." Gepetto made his thoughts on the matter quite clear, crossing his arms. He seemed quite annoyed with the entire thing. "It is one of the great beasts. All of them nothing but trouble."

 

Shaking her head, Red grabbed hold of the man and pulled him along. "Come on, Gepetto. The lass is making sense, we do not want Ahab messing up the city."

 

The old man groaned, but came along. "Fine, fine! Come along, children. I will show you the way to the City."

 

For a short while, they moved through the corridors of the whale, long caverns. Without Gepetto, they would probably have moved faster, but would have been lost in the maze that was the inside of the great whale.

 

Turning around a corner, the darkness faded. A large cavern before them, illuminated by torches a long a path, leading to a small island in a lake of stomach acid. The entire cavern, island, walls and roof all held scraps and pieces of houses, ships, castles and all manner of debris, held together by rope, spit and prayers. It was a chaotic mess, but still, it was clearly a city. A city of the lost, of the disappeared. 

 

Commotion could be heard from inside the city. Someone was fighting, people were yelling!

[RocketLord]

Forever Boy

 

"I have read Dracula." Pan seemed unusually stiff. "You would not want to meet his equivalent in Neverworld." Whatever it was, the stiffness passed, and he let out a short laugh at Gepetto's explanation. "Ah, yes. Let me tell you stories of crocodiles and whales, tigers and hounds, one of these days. They are not what one would consider the norm."

 

His dust illuminated the path as they travelled through the beast's inner caverns, until they stood before the city. The commotion was great, the noise was great, and he laughed. "I wonder who that is... Shall we, my dear Gauss?" He bowed while standing on the air, while he motioned with his head towards the city.

Edited April 17, 2020 by RocketLord

[Azuth65]

"Forever Boy, I didn't exactly want to meet the Neverworld equivalent of Ahab and his white whale, yet here we are.  At this point, I'm picturing Vlad von Zarovich turned up to eleven.  Probably with a healthy dose of the vampires from 30 Days of Night thrown in for extra nightmare fuel," she groused.  After a minute she added with a wink, some mirth in her voice, "And I'm sure, because you're you, you've messed with him in the past too."

 

As they looked over the city, if she was being honest with herself she would call it a shanty town with delusions of grandeur, the sounds of violence wafting up from within, Gauss nodded, "Yeah, that'd be him."  Turning to their guides she asked, "You guys good to get back on your own without us?  If we don't deal with this, your city is going to get digested."

[RocketLord]

GM

 

"Yes, yes, of course we can get back," Gepetto grumbled. "We have lived here for years!"

 

One of the larger buildings in the city, a tall ship that was standing on its front, smashed into the ground shook, smoke rising from below it.

 

"Just go already. Do not worry about us!" Red seemed to have a cooler head. "That thing with the smoke, that is the tower! If that falls, the entire city will be smashed!"

[RocketLord]

Forever Boy

 

Despite the chaos and the situation, Pan smirked at Selena. "Maybe I have. Maybe I have not." 

 

He was glimmering, pixie dust starting to fall off him, like he was preparing for something, his feet slowly lifting higher above the ground. 

 

"I will go ahead. Catch up if you can, yes?" There was a bit of a challenge to his tone, and then he was gone, a streak of glimmering gold flying towards the so-called tower.

[Azuth65]

"See you guys down there," Gauss called over her shoulder as she took off after Forever Boy, trying to avoid the trail of pixie dust he was leaving in his wake.  'Between the whale drool and the pixie dust, this hoodie's pretty much toast,' she mentally groaned, 'Small potatoes if Ahab doesn't calm his rusty ass down but still...'

 

Racing into the unnaturally cavernous stomach of the beast, she flew low over the shanties that comprised the 'city', looking for the source of that last crash before finally landing on a sturdy looking building.  "Hey, captain Asshole!  Forever Boy and I hope you're happy, you found your stupid whale," she yelled towards the chaos below.

[RocketLord]

GM

 

The tower was not much of a tower. It was a ship, smashed into the ground. A quite large ship, in fact, on with at least three massive masts that all stuck out to the side. They were splintered and broken, sails and ropes hanging from them. The tower stretched up far into the darkness near inside of the whale's stomach, far higher than one would expect it to be able to go, even with the massive size of the whale from the outside. In fact, the end of the ship could not be seen in the darkness above.

 

Ahab was climbing the tower, pushing his way through anyone in his way. Many had made makeshift homes along his path, in cabies, on stairs. Even as he vertically scaled the ship, intent on heading towards the darkness above, he took the chance to glare at Gauss and Forever Boy.

 

"You!" He stopped, holding on to a rail that he had been using to climb. "This is all your fault! If it was not for you, the whale would be dead, and I would never have been here again!" He reached for a harpoon, but didn't throw it quite yet.

[Azuth65]

"Yeah jackass and if you had calmed the hell down and stop throwing popcorn machines at people in a crowded theater, I wouldn't be tempted to shove that harpoon you're holding through your stomach.  Now, do you want to keep rehashing the past or do you want to get the hell out of this goddamn whale?" Gauss called back, leaning forward and sinking her hands into the pockets of her hoodie, fingers finding a steel washer in case Ahab took a shot at her.

[RocketLord]

Forever Boy

 

Pan spreads his hands out to the side. Oh, no, this was not the time for talking anymore. Well, not only talking, at least. It wasn't something that anyone was likely notice, but far below, on the ground, his shadow was gone.

 

"Come now, Ahab. Is this any way to act? This is not your world, things are different here."

 

From the building Ahab was climbing, Pan's shadows stretched out, grasping on to Ahab's legs and pulling at him.

 

"Stick around! You wanted the whale, now you are in it!"

[RocketLord]

GM

 

"That damned shadow!" 

 

Obviously, Ahab had met Forever Boy's shadow before. And he didn't seem to like it. He yelled something, he cursed and screamed, then threw a harpoon that went very wide, flying past Forever Boy and somewhere into the darkness of the whale.

 

"I will kill you! Both of you! I am the hero here! You are nothing but gnats! The whale will die!"

[Azuth65]

Gauss withdrew her hands from her hoodie pocket and lined up her shot as Pan bound up Ahab in solid shadows.  Flicking a thick steel washer off her thumb, like she flipping a coin, she concentrated and formed a magnetic field to send the coin forward.  While she was aiming for a limb shot, Ahab's struggles to break free moved him out of the way of the shot, the slug embedding itself into the wood roof of the building under the mad captain's feet.

 

"You know, the more you talk the more I think tossing you into the whale's digestive juices would be a good idea...," the teen deadpanned.

[RocketLord]

Forever Boy

 

He could feel it. The whale was moving, even as they fought inside it. He could hear it, something was happening.

 

"We need to get out of here, and fast!" 

 

The people inside the whale would be safe, at least, but something was happening. A strange sensation, something that made the hairs at the back of Pan's neck stand up. "Up, up and away!" he called out to Gauss again, pointing up, towards the ceiling of the whale's belly, towards the blowhole far above. The one that Ahab had tried to reach.

 

His shadow spun around Ahab, trying to leash him, to bind him further, but Pan did not move quite yet. Not until Selena followed, at least.

[RocketLord]

GM

 

Metal rained down around him, a shadow lashed on to him, but Ahab stood tall, struggling to push the shadow away, while he grabbed another harpoon. 

 

"I will not end my days in the belly of the beast, scum! This is not the way for Ahab to go!"

 

He raised the harpoon high, took aim... and let it fly towards Gauss with deadly force and precision.

[Azuth65]

Gauss, sensing the deadly sharp steel blade heading for her back turned in mid-air, focused her powers and caught it before she could be harmed by Ahab's backstabbing attack.  In a rush of indignant rage, barely even thinking she fired the harpoon back at Captain Ahab, the blade sinking home.  "Meliodas, wishes he could return spear fire that good..." she muttered to herself before resuming her chasing after Pan.

 

Once within earshot she called out, "Pan!  Wait!  What about the people still down there?  Red and Geppetto?  We can't just leave them stuck in here."

[RocketLord]

Forever Boy

 

Pan stopped, pausing, looking at Selena.

 

"That is their story, is it not?" he asked, reaching a hand out towards the people on the ground below them. "The whale is diving. If you want to escape, then now is the time. Who knows where it will go?"

 

Still, he seemed to hesitate, like he wasn't quite sure whether to go, or not.

 

"We have to make a choice. Stay, remaining trapped until the Whale surfaces, where no one know, or go, and maybe we can save everyone one day."

[RocketLord]

GM

 

"We'll be fine!" Gepetto's voice was a growl, its volume raised by a strange wooden megaphone like device he was holding up to his mouth. 

 

Ahab shook, pulling the harpoon from his shoulder where it had hit. Sparks flew from the spot where his mechanics had been punctured by his weapon weapon. "I will kill you for that!" His voice was deep, darker than before. Calm, no more roars or threats, just a coldly stated fact.

Edited July 20, 2020 by RocketLord

[Azuth65]

Lowering her voice to a more normalized level as she got closer to Forever Boy she said, "Assuming their story is to be stuck inside this stupid, TARDIS-like whale, I don't think leaving them at the mercy of Ahab is very heroic.  And that's what we're at Claremont for isn't it?  To be the best heroes we can be."

 

Turning her eyes back to the enraged whaler she gulped and tried to keep her hands from shaking, "Now, are we cowards who would leave civilians to a royally pissed villain or are we heroes who deserve the stories written about us?"

[RocketLord]

Forever Boy

 

Pan stopped, staring at Selena. He seemed utterly confused, like he had trouble deciding what he believed. His usual smile was gone, his mouth slightly open.

 

Then he smiled once more, a wide grin. "Never a coward, never a villain."

 

He reached out a hand, offering it to Selena, as he faced Ahab.

 

"Together, then. To the jaws and death and until the end."

[Azuth65]

Taking Pan's hand she turned back towards the enraged captain and the shanty town built within the impossible whale.  "Let me let you in on a secret Forever Boy.  We can't die, my friend.  You know why?  Because we are so... very... pretty. We are just too pretty for God to let us die.  Just look at that chiseled jaw!" she paraphrased from one of her favorite science-fiction shows.

 

Taking another steel slug from her pocket she lined up her shot and slammed as much of her will into her attack she sent the coin screaming down towards Ahab, magnetic fields springing into being and vanishing just as quickly guiding her projectile to strike home.

[RocketLord]

GM

 

Ahab looked up, the projectile hit its target. A perfect shot, a perfect hit, he would have been knocked back and away if Pan's shadow wasn't holding on to him. Falling limp, he let out a single, short groan, while the two pretty heroes flew towards him.

 

And then, the tower shook. The entire shanty town built inside the whale rolled back and forth, as a massive roar echoed through the cave. 

 

The Whale was waking up, aware of what was transpiring inside. As Pan's shadow fled to his side once more, a massive gust of wind dragged at them from above. Together, they could resist it. Ahab was not quite as lucky. His prone form was pulled up, into the darkness of the blowhole above.

 

Then, another roar. Another pull of air, this time much stronger than the last one. In the shanty town below, everyone was struggling to hold on. Bits and pieces of the town were pulled away, towards teh blow hole.

 

The third and final blow was the one that did it. With far more force than either Gauss or the Forever Boy could withstand, they were pulled up, out, being catapulted out of the whale and into the night sky.

 

The whale leapt out of the water. For a moment it appeared it wished to swallow them again. It was monstrous, greater in size than any creature should be. Then, it was gone. Vanished, almost as if it had never been there. 

 

Ahab was nowhere to be seen, or heard.