Powers and Principalities

"Powers and Principalities" is a [SEASON NUMBER] thread started on [IRL DATE] and finished on [IRL DATE].
==Summary==
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==Full Text==
“Get up,” Nio growled, pulling Liam and Sav to their feet. It was difficult to see where they currently stood, which must have meant they were still underground. The clearest detail they could make out was a hallway that curved away from them at the end of the hall of round, cave-like openings–it showed some kind of light source from around the corner. 
Liam tried reaching out to the Changeling again, and cursed when he felt they were out of reach. But he could hear the thundering sounds of distant cannon fire and heavy, gargantuan footsteps, and it was a relief to know that they were still under the battlefield somewhere. 
“We have to group back up with everyone,” he whispered loudly. 
“I ain’t making another fucking portal after that,” Nio said stiffly, pulling off the water from their clothes and hovering it around them in a shimmering hoop. “We’re gonna end up a thousand feet in the sky if that freaky guy keeps interfering.”
"So what do we do?"
Mar 29
"Coward." Sav replies, mostly joking as he begins to grab up some rock and turn them molten to use them for light. "Well, I could try and tunnel us out. Given that we don't know where we are that probably not the best idea. But it looks like the tunnel keeps going that way."
Mar 29
"I guess follow up on it, see if we can get our bearings?" Nio suggested.
Liam was already moving forward. "Might as well, we do not have time to piss around." He let shadows unfold from his feet to quiet their movement, and they followed a seemingly-normal hallway that dipped rapidly, forming a sharp angle downwards in almost a slide or a chute. The further they went, the less impractical it was for any kind of man-made structure or building.
Still damp from the trek underwater, Liam lost his footing on the steep surface, and nearly took Nio out with him. They immediately dropped all semblance of stealth, racing after him as he slid downwards in a shower of dust and rock, and they both yelped as they saw a steep dropoff straight ahead, seemingly out of nowhere.
Mar 29
"Shitshitshit!" Sav exclaim as you watched Liam begin to slide towards the dark. He had to do something, and only one thing came to mind. It was something he was working on, but hadn't perfected it yet necessarily. But now was not the time to be picky in terms of testing grounds.
He focused on the drop off at the bottom and the stone just before it. He began to liquefy it into molten rock, just enough so he would be able to manipulate it. You then tried to create a platform big enough to halt his descent as he would rapidly cool it. He prayed to the gods that it would work.
Mar 29
Nio threw all the water that they had across the surface of the rock to further solidify it, creating a cloud of hot steam that billowed into the tunnel opening, swallowing Liam as he slid uncontrollably to the edge. Nio and Sav raced up to the drop, ready to drag Liam up to safety.
Instead, they heard a strong "FUCK!" a healthy 20 feet below them, and by the time Nio had cleared the steam away and Sav had parted the makeshift platform, they saw Liam dissolve into a mass of black sandlike shadows, falling slowly downwards into a scene they could barely believe existed. The only reason they could behold the absolutely massive cavern before them were because of the crepuscular rays of bloody moonlight filtering in from above through cracks wider than any of them were tall, like a moody spotlight highlighting thousands of meters of depth from the high ceiling above to the ground far, far below. Constellations of uneven stalactites to dwarf the teeth of Fenrir dripped downwards, amongst those, well-fashioned and masoned pillars as wide as a large town steadied the ceiling above, which seemed to be supporting the weight of the entirety of High Central itself. They could even see slight variations in shadow to their right, from just about where the Rebellion was invading, and occasionally some unknown debris tumbling down, tiny in scale to the cavern it fell into. Waterfalls of all sizes poured into the place in intervals, probably from the endless moat outside. The further down the immense walls they looked, the clearer the scale of the place became, and there were even larger tunnels down towards the ground of the cave.
Below them, it became clear this was not an innocent opening or sinkhole that nobody knew of. On the very wall they stood in, Sav and Nio could see plenty more openings, and scaffoldings and stairways and ramps in precarious amounts hugging the cliff. Some even had people, more of Central's united, armed forces, standing watch on these platforms, though they were distant enough to not have heard anything. Liam's dusty form seemed to be trying to drift towards one of these, his descent slowed for the moment.
Mar 29
Sav quickly covered his mouth before his expletives revealed their location. Now that they had a bit more time and Liam wasn't moving so quickly he tried to create another platform for him to land on.
Mar 29
Liam caught this one; he re-formed on it as quietly as possible, hissing under his breath as the hot stone stung his paws. He looked up to Nio and Sav as they slowly worked their way down to his level.
"Where the fuck are we?" he whispered, almost mouthing the words as he scooted to the edge of the platform, wondering if he should measure the distance and jump.
"You think I know!?" Nio pointed to one of the nearer waterfalls, which still seemed to be over a mile away. "Look, I need water. Could swim up that thing back to the surface."
"But I wanna be able to tell them what we saw..." Liam craned his neck over the side, trying to make out the details at the bottom. Much had been built at the base of the largest pillar, raised platforms and magic lighting as well as braziers and bonfires. Most notably, there seemed to be the supine body of some kind of creature to challenge the size of the Construct, although dead or sleeping, it was hard to tell. Nio hesitated, clearly torn between picking the safe option and the heroic one.
Mar 29
"Liam is right." Sav whispered. "If we're not up there we had better be making ourselves useful. Besides we have to get down to get to the fall anyway. Let's go check it out."
Mar 31
Nio's pale cheeks rounded as they blew out a breath and then gestured for both men to come to the edge with them. "Okay, but no more lava thingies. It's loud as Hel."
With a gesture, Nio helped the three of them up into an ice chute that they formed along the cliffside, mimicking the design of the stairs and scaffolding that High Central had built, but much more slick and efficient, cupped up on their right side to save anyone from falling again. They pulled ice from behind Sav and placed it in front of Liam, staying in the middle to ensure they didn't lose either of them. They paused just before one of the first large tunnel mouths in their way, catching their breath, marveling at how much distance still lay below them. Focusing on the details, Liam thought he could see more details of the platform, and the strange corpse that lay around it. There was a natural dais in the uneven, cracked ground that supported the structure, and there even seemed to be many stations or even temporary buildings spreading outwards from the central spectacle. At the weird civilization's highest point, something was glowing--some kind of huge box, small from their height, but visible because it was highlighted in a glowing golden web. Liam's neck fur started to lift, and he brushed it back down, annoyed by the random reaction.
"I wish we hadn't lost contact with everyone," Nio muttered.
"Yeah, that part sucks," Liam agreed, shifting his focus to the next-largest platform, which had a handful of guards on it, still unaware of their presence. "We're too far away from the beacons." A desperate idea struck him, and he twisted his nose. "I don't know if I should do it yet, but...I'm still attached to the Conclave's minds...maybe I could tap back in..."
"Are you fucking crazy?"
Apr 1
"Okay I don't know what that means, but I'm gonna go with... Mmmmbad. Maybe we should go check out that box though." Sav replied as he pressed his hands together.
Apr 1
"They have a mental network just like ours, but it's sustained by...something, I don't know what. It's what caused them all to unite." They all slunk across the tunnel entrance, briefly obscured by Liam's shadows. "I could literally find out right now, maybe we could even bring it down--"
"What if you go nuts and we can't bring you back and you kill us?" Nio demanded. "I had to go do some stupid shit to get un-hooked from them, and that's not something I wanna risk. Why am I the voice of reason here?"
"The whole forward team could be dead, I'm kind of getting impatient with reason right now," Liam snapped. "You're not half-breeds. I won't go insane when I see you. I know I won't."
Apr 1
"You don't even know what's sustaining the network." He hisses. "And for all you know, as soon as you plug in they'll know exactly where we are."
Liam simmered, blank white eyes darting back and forth between Sav's, grinding his teeth slightly. "Fine."
He darted towards the scaffolding's edge, vaulting the rope railing and flinging himself towards the next landing. Before he landed, he seemed to blossom into darkness, a huge, inky cloud covering the platform. Nio rolled their eyes, peeling a sheet of mossy water from off the wall besides them and forming it into two long blades iced to their forearms. "He's gonna get us killed," they growled, before following suit, intending to take down as many guards as they could before they could raise some kind of alarm.
Apr 1
Sav presses his lips into a line as he watches Liam jump. "He likes to throw himself off things doesn't he?" Hearing Nio's response he chuckles. "We all gotta go some time." He says as he forms a a 5 pointed star with some mostly cooled lava, but the points all curve in the same direction. He starts making his way down as well, following Nio's lead and killing whatever soldiers they come up on as quietly as possible.
Apr 1
The dark fog masked their quick work; one of the final guards, a thick and short Conclave member, stumbled out of the miasma and opened his mouth to cry out a warning, but an ice blade struck him through the back of the neck and out through his throat, making him choke and fall over the edge. Nio sprinted out of the slowly-dissipating darkness and waved their arm wildly, veins pulsing raised and slightly blue as they manipulated the dead body and its inner liquids to stop falling, pulling it back onto the platform and sucking his body of blood and freezing it in heavy layers on their armor and leathers. It looked ghastly in the dim lighting, which only grew darker as they descended. Soon, only the torches and artificial lighting from the encampment below would be their only source of light. Liam could see just fine, but Nio was struggling.
"There." Liam's heavy, ice-encrusted paw pointed to a spot in their current path of travel, where the last wisps of a huge waterfall were misting into the air without reaching the ground. "If we get to that one, we can see what's going on and have a quick escape."
The three of them jumped as a far-off, high-pitched chime sounded, followed by a roar from the Construct that was barely audible in contrast. Liam's heart clenched. Nio studied him, lower face still concealed, but they reached for his inner forearm and squeezed it with a sudden tenderness that didn't befit the hardened, sardonic nix.
"Almost there, kid."
Apr 2
Sav let out a sigh of relief as the guards fell quickly. This was like a hive, and he would hate to wake them. He began to move towards the waterfall in question but froze as he heard the loud cry from the Construct and shivered. He would never get used to that. He noticed Liam tense and Nio's uncharacteristic reaction. He was curious but decided not to say any for now. That could wait until after the battle. For now they had more important information to gather.
Apr 2
The next lowest platform was actually underneath them in the opposite direction, requiring them to lower a rope and make their way down stealthily, dispatching another pair of guards on their way.
The size of the population at the base of the cavern grew more apparent with each movement, but what was lacking was sound. There was noise, yes, but it was only boots against stone, the thud of large objects being placed, chains jingling, ropes creaking. It was unclear how unsettling it was before it struck them--nobody was talking. Not one word was being traded amongst the people, not even the occasional shout. The box was a little more clear now--it was taller than it was long, with some kind of carving on the front, and the web that wrapped around it seemed like it could be some kind of enchanted thick rope or cord, and was keeping it upright while being rooted at several points in the ground, in the gargantuan column behind it, even in a few stalagmites.
Nio cursed under their breath. "Of course they're only thinking to each other..."
A cold stormfront seemed to blow across Liam's mind, which tingled and crackled intensely before he hurriedly attempted to throw up barriers the way Nala had taught him. "Oh fu--" he gasped before catching himself with the back of his hand to his mouth, gesturing for the other two to get down. He met their eyes and pointed directly downwards, through the platform they were now belly-down on. Whatever it was...it was right below them.
Apr 2
Sav curses as he sees the box and how tightly it's wrapped up. "Hel there's no way we're getting that thing." He quickly gets down at Liam's indication. "Is it that ice guy again?"
Apr 2
Liam shook his head, worried to even breathe too deeply. But it wasn't their voices the being was sniffing out--it was their minds. Liam panicked, completely unsure of how to protect all three of them from its influence.
Nio quickly picked up on what was happening, though, and they elbowed Sav. "Sing--sing something," they whispered. "Anything. Quietly."
Apr 2
He nods, unsure as to why and starts singing a quite folk song of his people. A song about the Nixes and the pooka joining together under the earth and becoming one people and living together despite the hardships they faced.
Apr 3
Liam reached out and gripped Sav's wrist thankfully, cold burning against the lava nix's warm brown skin. The three of them focused on the tune as hard as they could, trying to maintain a shield of whatever was searching for them. The presence shifted by again, slower this time, and it felt like an ocean storm, waves of cold intent searching and prying.
The half-breed's heart was hammering an uneven staccato against his throat and ears. It was human, but it wasn't. It was demon, but it wasn't. It was...something in between.
A throaty hum sounded from just about where he estimated the creature to be, several yards down, and all three of them saw a humanoid figure step out from underneath the wood slats and slink over to the edge. They wore a helmet that they immediately recognized as being another of the devices similar to what Tezzeret wore--a mechanical helmet. This one had small, glowing green exhaust ports in rows across the helmet, and pulses of the same light raced down its tubes in waves, appearing under the skin of their bare back and fizzing out near the tailbone. Tatters of another surgical gown hung around their waist. They looked out over the proceedings below, considering them, tilting its altered head. It was still searching.
Nio felt sick. If there was another one of these...people besides Tezz, there had to be even more, probably just as hostile.
Apr 3
Sav wraps his fingers around Liam's wrist in return giving his a gentle squeeze. He keeps singing quietly, eyes closed, not even wanting to look at this... Creature that hunted. As the song ended he began a stirring song filled with hope. It was a song they used to sing after particularly harsh encounter with the whispering death. It reminded them not to give up hope of a brighter future and that by sticking by one another they would make it through this and any other trial.
Apr 3
The chill feeling over their minds paused, and then took the shape of water droplets humming and dancing in abstract patterns, pushed by vibrations of something. Liam's breath hitched as he realized it was in rhythm with Sav's song.
A second creature dropped into a crouch from above them, seemingly out of nowhere, and it made them all jump out of their skin. Nio nearly threw a wave of icy daggers, but Liam snatched their arm upon seeing a newly-familiar short, gaunt figure, darkness oozing from a metallic crown, eyes ghostly gray. For a split second, everyone stared at him, waiting with bated breath for a fight to break out once more. Then he lifted a finger made of pure ice and put it to his mouth--a signal to be quiet.
The consciousness around theirs grew stronger. Unless Liam was already insane with fear, he could've sworn that it was...shielding them. The one hunting below began moving away, further down into the dark, not seeming to notice them. Tezz's hollow gaze fixed on Liam's. Liam felt the tiniest flame of recognition. Treepelt, Tezz asked again, silently. Clover. Melira. Will.
Liam only knew Tezzeret by name and through distant memories given to him by Nala. The demon had helped explain why Liam's earliest memories of his mother had been of shoulder-shaking sobs and dead-eyed stares out windows. Tezz, Tree's closest friend, was murdered by High Central while working with half-breed insurgents when Liam was only a year old, and there was no way he should be standing here, even half-dead, asking about her, about his widow and children. Through their strange connection, Liam could feel that Tezz's hostility was stayed by recognizing him for the features he shared with his mother. The same green eyes, auburn hair, short-furred mottled cat ears. He did his best to organize his answer through the hot adrenaline in his veins.
Tree and Will--alive. Helping fight up above. Clover--alive, on Haligan. He mentally stumbled over Melira. He didn't know, he wasn't sure if Tree or even Clover knew where or how she was, and he was afraid to lie. Tezz didn't outwardly react, but his mind twitched and rumbled, and then turned aggressively outward to Liam's two companions, seeming to darken and twist, demanding their identity and intentions.
Apr 3
Sav quickly silenced his singing as he felt the matching rhythm in his mind, letting out a quiet gasp as the creature landed in front of them. He felt it press into his mind as it demanded his identity. "I'm Savarthan, I'm here to help put an end to Central." He responds nervously, too afraid to lie.
Apr 3
"Nio...s-same," Nio stuttered, throat constricted, unsure of what else to say.
Tezz's jaw hung open, and for a moment, the tubes pulsed on their own, and discordant melodies whispered out of his throat again. "I come as a blade...a sacred guardian--" He seemed to snap out of it again with a choked sound.
"You can't be here," he breathed thinly, the words broken as though he spoke them as a second language.
Nio's hand was hurting Liam's arm. "I hate this," they hissed, almost sounding like they had spoken their thoughts aloud involuntarily from sheer panic.
"What's down there?" Liam asked instead. "If it's dangerous we need to warn--"
"Others like me. She'll have them tear you apart. Let me send you away."
Apr 3
Swallowing his nerves he spoke up to ask a stuttering question. "Wh-what's in the box?"
Tezz's glowing eyes fixed on Sav. "The present."
"What the fuuuuuuuuck..." Nio mumbled in alarm.
He quickly shrinks back as Tezz's eyes lock on to him. He decided not to ask anymore questions.
Liam, however, had no such qualms. "The Hel does that mean?" he whispered harshly.
"I don't know or understand. It's what she calls it." The earth quaked slightly above, sending the barest of shockwaves through the scaffolding they all crouched on.
"Who?"
Liam had barely gotten the word out and suddenly it felt like his brain had been yanked by Tezz's into deep, cold water. Any sound present in his ears numbed, but strings of voices became clear, and he realized these were the sounds he had heard while traveling through the massive tunnels. The loudest of them all was an adult feminine voice, a clear High Central accent, but with a cadence and the strangest echoing clicking and distorting behind each consonant, sickly sweet in tone.
"--a delicate process, my dears. Be patient for Aursis' return. They will bring us what I seek. Then it will be just about time."
Liam gasped as though he had risen out of the ocean, senses coming back out of sync and a ringing in his ears. "Aursis--!?"
"--is not her. Aursis is one of us. She hunts on the surface."
"We have to get back up there," Nio said decisively, thoroughly done with being below ground. "If one of those things is up there--"
"I have to stay." Liam shocked himself by saying so. He had to know what was going on, he couldn't stand the idea of returning and only being able to answer 'I don't know' to anything asked of him. The yoke of fate felt extremely heavy. "I have to find out what's going on, you two should go without me. I can stay hidden."
"Fuck that noise." Sav said, forgetting about Tezz for a moment. "Rebels don't leave one another behind. I'm with you, wherever this leads." He responds.
Tezz was clearly unhappy, but the sound caused by any potential disturbance wouldn't have been worth it to drag the three out of the cavern against their will.
"What is Aursis hunting?" Nio asked, trying to distract themselves from the fact that they were also not going to leave these two knuckleheads down here by themselves. "Maybe when she brings it down here we can fight her."
"A beacon." The half-demon tilted his head. "Whatever that is."
Sav's eyes widen in surprise. "Shit." He curses quietly. Thinking about it for a second he says. "The beacons are how we're communicating en mass... Wait... How does she know we're using them?"
Tezz shrugged. "We must've had a mole," Nio hissed.
"Maybe one of us goes back up there and warns--"
His voice was cut off by a sudden strange deafness. Instinctively, everyone looked up--even those down in the cavern below them.
All three of them shouted and swore as it felt like they were suddenly staring into the sun--a perfectly straight beam of light melted through the ceiling at an angle and hit the wall of the cavern about halfway down, immediately causing showers of earth to begin falling through the holes left behind by each. The encampments below began to react aloud, shouting in reactive alarm. Liam gasped raggedly, squeezing his eyes shut and ducking his head and covering his ears, feeling pain in his chest as though he were in cardiac arrest.
Nala!?
Sav was blinded by the sudden intense light and heat, cursing loudly as he instinctively grabbed his two comrades and pulled them down, using his hands to protect the back of their necks as the world quaked and crumbled around them. As the quakes ceased he sat up and looked around. "Is everyone okay? What the hel, was that?"
Nio practically had to chokehold Liam to keep him down, throwing up a frozen bubble around them to preemptively avoid any stray rubble, and to shield their eyes. The red light from above was already darkening with falling sprays of mud and rock, and something smaller--
"People--" Nio gasped in realization, gut threatening to dry heave any second. "Oh my fucking Thor, those are people--"
"LET GO!" Liam clawed into Nio's arm, and their eyes watered in pain as blood began to pour over their skin. But they held on, they couldn't afford to let go. "Something's wrong! NALA!!"
Tezz seemed locked in a trance, eldritch crown tilted skywards as he, too, watched barely-visible figures briefly catch the blood moon. The bright laser threatened to sear his retinas, looking strange through the transparent, icy walls around them. His tortured throat moved as he mouthed words audible only to himself, words that helped bind his fragmented mind.
"In a city of ice...there are burning cathedrals..."
The other patrolling prowlers that had previously ignored them were now closing in, drawn by the shouts and screams. The Construct's beam didn't seem to be a problem they were interested in facing quite yet. The green-spotted hybrid being stumbled their way up the stairs to their left, while another with a glowing orange chest cavity silhouetting their ribcage circled underneath them to their right, metal headgear also fitted with two lower jaws framing their face.
"Change of plans, get us out of--" Nio whipped their head around to find Tezz. The only thing in his place was a puddle of cold water settling on the ground. "Fuck."
Seeing the advancing creatures he quickly reinforces Nio's bubble with one of rock and stone, hopefully buying them some time. "I vote we say fuck it and try to portal out of here."
Nio didn't even take the time to respond; they picked up the water off the ground, threw it into a circle which immediately froze over into shadow, and pulled both of them forward, just in time for one of the half-demons to begin cracking the hardened stone bubble open and slashing an arm through, glowing claws tracing trails through the air.
The cave they emerged in was surprisingly calm, though they could still hear the sounds of chaos--now they were level with it. The beam illuminated the opening of a shallow tunnel, from a completely different angle; the portal had somehow taken them to the top of the cavern, thousands of feet above where they were before.
Liam collapsed to the cave floor in Nio's arms, chest heaving, involuntary tears slipping over numb cheeks as they stared towards the middle of the unfathomably large hollow. They could clearly see the bodies Nio had pointed out; it was difficult to tell whether they still lived or not. They had so far to fall, and yet it was impossible to look away.
The beam sputtered out and died, darkening the cavern once more for several heartbeats, and then it was replaced by a far weaker source. A tiny flash of light, just like the shoal of fish in the moat depths, sparking in one spot, then another, then a few more. Then the lost trio was completely overwhelmed by a tidal wave of familiar thoughts, feelings and images--they were connected to the network again.
____
Treepelt screamed, of course--it was a mortal instinct, one that she was immediately punished for by clouds of moist dust, settling so far back in her face she almost felt it behind her eyes. Not once did she allow Vox to fall away from her. Their survival would depend on each other, no matter what happened.
The world became a blur of pitch blackness and flashes of impossibly bright white, and then faint scarlet and sprays of heavy, brackish water. A slab of stony earth passed them at a slightly-faster speed than they were traveling. The whipping air was freezing and the sense of free falling was like something out of an unreal nightmare. Just as she had hoped, she could still sense the entire Rebellion above them, and she didn't know how that gave her a spark of hope, but it did. One of them would pull through. She knew it.
The couple was suddenly swallowed by frozen darkness, and then violently launched sideways instead of up, and the back of her skull cracked against the haft of her hammer, sending her into warm darkness.
____
Vox and an unconscious Treepelt rolled against a cold, hard surface several times before coming to rest, and beside them, several other bodies groaned, most of them stirring and trying to sit up. Those with better vision in the dark than others could see mostly Rebels in their animalistic skull helmets--Ellis and Blair among them--and of the final two of the rescued ensemble, one was Conclave, built heavy and strong with cool-toned dark skin and tied-back greying black hair, and one was wearing battered standard-issue High Central guard armor, with the circular florette crest emblazoned on a dirty banner hanging from his gorget. He seemed to be of Wildeast heritage, with pale white eyes and the sides of his head shaved short. The cave they had appeared in was full of the sound of coughing, choking and panic, and everyone scrambled away from the edge, which fell straight down into the pit they had nearly lost their lives to.
Before the scout had a chance to recover and speak, he felt a mind lock onto his through the multitudes of Rebels in their network, a voice he would always recognize.
"Dad? Dad, is that you!?"
Liam's terrified voice was almost cut off by Lila's response: "Vox, we're sending people down to come get you. Stay alive."
Falling. Spinning... sideways?
The scream of Tree against his ear, combined with the violent rush of air against his head, overloaded the scout's senses. Vox couldn't register any of the seconds of falling that still somehow felt like an eternity before he was forcibly thrown across ground, bouncing into a skid as he came to a stop against a wall. His head was the first thing to make contact; while it was enough to send him into a full daze, he was still conscious.
Ellis groaned, having been spared from any major injuries in the initial fall - only to have Blair tumble into him only seconds later. The ferret swore indignantly under his breath, getting to his feet and shaking out his fur to free it of rocks and debris.
"Right smart idea ye' had there, ye' damn-"
His words cut off at the sight of Treepelt, visibly unconscious. The man alongside her did not look in much better shape. While his partner had seen better days, the pair had escaped what could have been a far worse fate.
"...shit. So, uh, Vox." Blair cleared his throat, eyes catching the additional company before he spoke again. "What do ye' s'pose we do from 'ere?"
The scout grumbled, unenthused to have the first voice he heard be Blair's. The annoyance was short lived - at the first sight of Tree, he placed two fingers against her neck.
A pulse. Thank the Gods.
"I don't know." Vox's voice was gravely with a hint of fear. "I was relying on the burrows... and the beacon, but I think both of those plans are out the window now."
He froze; the beacon. He had no way of knowing if the network was still intact, but he had to try.
Mayday, mayday, mayday. We're alive. Location to be determined. Please acknowledge.
“Dad!!” Liam was panicking that he wasn’t being heard. From the general direction his father’s mayday came from, he could surmise that they had fallen below the surface but had somehow had his fall broken. There was no sign of Tezz or the other half-demons anywhere.
He looked frantically back to the other two. “Do we have a way to make a signal?”
“We really should move our asses outta here–” Nio growled, but Liam shook his head.
“No way. Now there’s others down here.”