ic The Last Free Place

[Avenger Assembled]

Sea Devil took to the air, the song of the hostile water in her mind. Turning into water was something Atlanteans did; a reflection of their fell connection with the stuff of life itself. But this was no Atlantean thing, which made it - well, something that didn't bear too much thinking about it. She raised her trident and bellowed a Lemurian promise - "I will crack your bones and taste the marrow!" - an oath to the restless dead that they would not rest here, dry bones so far from the waters of home, but instead return to the body of the people. Her trident crackled with eldritch power as it formed a symbol in the air -a glorious golden sign that to a Surfacer's eyes resembled a flower made of two question marks and a single blade hanging below. The symbol's power flashed a brilliant color, reflecting in searing golden light as a version of it briefly flared to life on the dual body of the steam monster before flaring out. 

[trollthumper]

The cry of Deep One prayer, paired with the golden sigil, seemed to draw the attention of the many faces. Their eyes fell onto Sea Devil; some faces drew forward towards their brethren, whereas others recoiled. The phantasm seemed to be fighting against itself... and as it did, the people in its grasp were still caught in the boiling mist, their flesh burning. 

 

I wish we had time for a breakthrough... but we don't. Nick reached into the soil. He really didn't want to think on how easily the ectoplasmic hands surged from the earth - nor why they smelled so strongly of dead fish - but as they rose, mist met mist. The steam of the phantom was too yielding for his hands, but mortal flesh found fast purchase. He tried to pull gently, thinking of all the way this could go wrong... but he breathed a sigh of relief as the two were tugged back towards the firmament. They were still burned, and still seemed to be twitching in some sort of bizzare rapture, but he could handle the former. And, hopefully, the latter.

 

Unfortunately, dragging away the artists seemed to have the same effect on the creature as yanking a teddy bear away from a toddler. Its eyes focused as one... and as they fell on Artificer, they surged forward in a steaming coil, their wrath so great that they struck near enough that he could feel the scorching heat without actually getting scorched. But the whispers around him began to turn to screams. 

 

"Did you know? Did you know? When they came, did you lead them?"

[Dr Archeville]

Artificer

 

Heroditus felt his stomach churn at the sight of Aquaria's Golden Symbol, keep it together, keep it together.

 

Then the revulsion was replaced with dread, as he became aware of many eyes upon him.  Upon his very soul.

 

"I don't know what was done to you," he grunted as he withdrew more components from his bandolier as he dodged around steaming tentacles, "or by whom.  But I have some idea of what you are," he continued, connecting his inverted fire tube to a metallic cone, "and know of that which your kind worship.  That which eternal lies."  More bits added to his device, "So I would suggest you do the same, and... SLEEP!"

 

He'd brought the tiny trumpet-like device to his mouth at that last word, which amplified his word into a deafening roar, like unto that blown at the walls of Jericho.

 

[Avenger Assembled]

Though it pained Aquaria to say it, she finished the prayer from the Atlantean's lips - but from her, it was a promise of a future retribution for the souls of the innocent Deep Ones caught in this terrible fate. 

 

"In strange aeons - even death may die!" 

 

Her trident channeled all the might of the golden sign, a flaring, searing light that blasted deeply into the shadowy form of the eldritch ghosts. She thought of those Below and those above, her eyes bulging particularly wide, her flanks heaving with suppressed fury at this unholy blasphemy. I will find your bones and break them, she promised the dead silently, hoping against hope that the act would free their trapped spirits. 

 

For the one who had done all this - well, she made no promises at all. 

[trollthumper]

There was a moment of recognition in the eyes of the behemoth, the remembrance of childhood prayer, almost... until the blast struck its form, causing rents in the steam. Nick was happy to have the distraction, focusing his will on keeping the female artist alive. Her burns began to heal up, new skin forming over scalded flesh. It would still take some time...

 

Which he didn't seem to have. The entity roared, all sentiment gone, as if trying to buck at invisible chains. Gouts of boiling water fell from the air. Nick grabbed the artists and hauled them as far as he could - maybe I should have tried football instead of just smoking behind the school - getting out of the way of the brunt of the onslaught, his jacket deflecting the rest. 

 

"Who did this to you?" he asked, hoping it might cut through the madness. But he had his doubts. 

[Dr Archeville]

Artificer

 

This isn't working, I cannot channel enough power to- wait, no, the Atlantean chided himself, greater power is not the way, I should be trying to finesse this, study my foe, and-

 

One of the apparition's great blasts of steam slammed into him, knocking all breath out and sending him sprawling to the ground some feet away.  The force of the blast tore open his tunic, and the skin on his chest was red and peeling away.  The hastily-constructed device in his hands, and components in his still-open bandolier pouches, flew into the air, metal and crystalline bits reflecting the light of the few remaining fires, like some tiny new constellation, before clattering to the ground.  

 

Not like this... not... like......

 

[trollthumper]

The Atlantean hero fell to the ground, scalded and singed. The apparition looked down on him, with a flicker all too familiar to Sea Devil - the delight of a long quarry brought to a swift and terrible end. But, just as soon as she saw the light, it faded. The expression in the phantom's eyes grew hollow, longing. There was no determination or jubilation in its body language. There was simply a sense of surrender, the inevitable of carrying on because there is nothing else that can be done. 

 

Its steam coalesced into boiling claws, slowly descending towards the prone Artificer...

[Avenger Assembled]

Sea Devil

Sea Devil landed between Artificer and the ghosts of the unhallowed dead, and inside her armor her eyes flickered to the nearby Nick - before she focused again on the ghosts. She struck her trident against her chest, making a sound like a gong, and chanted in a base eldrich bellowing throb: 

 

"Vengeance! Vengeance! Vengeance!" And she extended her trident to the ghosts, as if inviting them to ride inside the fractured vessel of Hydra's power. "What we been! What we come to!" 

[trollthumper]

The cloud of steam froze, swirling and twisting over the burning house's lawn. One eye remained locked on the wounded Artificer, its fury fixed... but the other shifted towards Sea Devil. The twisting corpus brought the full gaze of this eye upon the Deep One, the head nearly splitting in half to maintain its focus between its two targets. The eye locked on Sea Devil seemed to soften for a second... before the tide of steam fell upon her.

 

As Nick Cimitiere focused his will to keep Artificer on this side of the grave, he turned one eye towards the assault. The steam did not enter Sea Devil's armor; it couldn't seem to find a crack in the design. But from inside, Sea Devil felt like she was burning. Not from the steam of an underwater caldera, but from under an unclouded sun on scorched earth. Her skin was cracking. Her gills were sandpaper. The earth turned to baked clay beneath her feet, then to grinding stone She didn't know where she was. The pressure was thin, the sounds piercing yet distant. It took her a while to pierce together the words she was hearing. 

 

"If you want back in the tank, you'll talk. Where are the others?"

[Avenger Assembled]

Sea Devil 

 

Ackweera met the pain, the rage, the torment of the murdered uneaten dead with her own feelings. Not the joy she felt on the Surface or the love for her friends; no, Deep Ones like this would find no succor in such feelings. She tasted her own blood. It wasn't the first time. 

 

She buries her knife in the Atlantean's throat. The young ate well that night! 

 

She eats the flesh of the Surfaceman - and mates for the first time beneath the howling hurricane sky. 

 

Crouching on a rock beneath the naked stars, she calls on the gods to drown this world! 

 

They were all scenes from her old life. From the war against the hated enemy of her people. From the tribe, starving and hungry, falling on a boat while she waited with the rest of the adolescents, and the celebration that followed. Of her grief and rage, all alone, cast away from the Dark Brothers below. That wasn't her life anymore, but it would give her a voice with the uneaten dead now. 

 

"<I will stop them. I will punish them. I am Aquaria Innsmouth. I have taken trophies from the sea of stars! I have killed false gods in Mother Hydra's name! I am her champion in the Hell Above! Give me your strength and I will make them pay for what they've done!>"