[Freezair]

They were underwater, they were alive, and a dark, noxious thing had its tentacles wrapped around them.

That was all they knew so far.

How far away this morning seemed, when they'd sat on the rim of the captain's cabin and joked about what they might find out here. How ignorant they'd been, not knowing that the person who walked beneath their paws had something insidious plan. How Ailbhe had mentioned those old stories their father had told, and how Ciara had brushed it off. And yet... here they were, some vile beast dragging them into the ocean depths, just like something out of their father's stories.

There had been light--for a little while. While it had still been there, Ailbhe fixed her water-blurred eyes on her sister and refused to look away. But the ocean grew gloomy around them. Similar to the way they could still breathe, the salt water didn't sting their eyes. But eventually, Ailbhe shut them anyway as they were dragged into the dark.

[Freezair]

Eventually, Ailbhe felt a glow on the other side of her eyes. A strange, green-tinged redness soaked through her eyelids, and she opened them.

Deep beneath them, on the seafloor, something was glowing. An eerie green pulsed in and out, like the breathing of a sleeping beast. Ailbhe immediately recognized it as the same green that had taken over the sky just before their boat had been attacked. Ciara was put in mind of bioluminescent deep-sea creatures, but a truly titanic number of them would have to be present there to create a glow of that magnitude.

Unsurprisingly, their captors were swimming right for it.

[Freezair]

The glow grew brighter the deeper the creature swam. It became clear that it was deeper down than it had seemed--and much, much larger. Ciara began to wonder why the incredible pressure all around them wasn't crushing them or causing them to become lightheaded. She supposed that whatever force was letting them breathe and see well underwater took care of that, too.

Shapes began to materialize in the glow beneath them. Towers and spires of rock rose up from the seafloor, bathed all over in emerald green.

Or... maybe they weren't made of rock at all.

[Freezair]

Ailbhe and Ciara squinted at the space below them. Though they couldn't confer, they came to the same conclusion: the shapes beneath them were not natural. As they grew closer, the carefully-carved arches and windows of the beautifully sculpted buildings came into view; this was a city. An intricate, sprawling city, growing up out of the seafloor as if nothing was wrong.

Of course, the various seafaring pet species of Evelon regularly built colonies on the seafloor. But Ciara knew of none who built so deep, nor with arcitecture like this.

[Freezair]

Soon, they were fully immersed in the light. A sickly greenish tinge washed over the pale Ailbhe; the darker Ciara looked like a scrap of seaweed. They looked off into the distance and saw the other captives, haunted looks on all of their faces.

And yet, it seemed hard to get a good look at the things carrying them. They always seemed to be in sharp silhouette, their edges blurry in the murk; the light seemed to shy away from their fetid forms. Ailbhe had almost come to forget the nauseating thing wrapped around her, but trying to get a good look at it made her all the more aware of its physical presence. The skin, so soft and oozy it seemed to be half-liquid; the feel of it like immersing her paws in a decomposing corpse. She swallowed a hot ball of vomit and closed her eyes once more.

[Freezair]

There was a soft splat and Ailbhe felt herself stop moving. The horrible tentacle slithered a retreat across the soles of her paws, and over her fur, she suddenly felt--air.

She opened her eyes.

Their group had docked. She was standing--somehow, standing--on a bumpy platform, surrounded by spires. Behind her rose an immense wall of dark seawater. Panic rose within her briefly, but she quickly realized it was still. The ocean here simply refused to come any further.

"AILBHE!"

A whump hit Ailbhe's back and she felt wet wings enfold her. She twisted her head around to see her sister staring at her with worried eyes. "Are yuh OK?"

"Sure am. But where the 'ell are we?"

[Freezair]

They peered around the strange dock as the other captives began to revive, each one wondering and trembling at the place they had found themselves.

The things around them were undeniably buildings. They had corners They had windows. They had arches. They had things that may have been doors. But up close, they didn't look as if they had been carved. There were slight imperfections and variations in each hole and piece that looked almost natural. It was as if they hadn't been carved so much as eroded into place. And yet there was no way they could be natural; everything was clearly designed with habitation in mind.

And then there were the carvings decorating the walls. Or at least, there seemed to be. Much like their captors, it seemed impossible to focus upon them. They seemed to look different head-on than they did out of the corner of the eye.

[Freezair]

Ailbhe flew around her sister's head while Ciara stood on the ground, gazing about in trepidation. "What should we do?" Ailbhe asked. "Should we jus' go on uhhead an' explore? Or do yuh think we should wait it out?"

Ciara glanced back. "There are a lot of uhtha captives 'ere. I'd say we oughtta confer with 'em first. Maybe split up an' explore this weird place. The things what was grabbin' us seem tuh have gone away."

Ailbhe nodded. It seemed as good a plan as any.

[Freezair]

The two returned to the group. Most of them had huddled closer together, protecting themselves in the same way a herd of deer might. They had similar wide-eyed expressions, as well. However, a few braver souls stared off into the distance, focused and intent, clearly straining with the same problem that now plagued Ailbie and Ciara.

Ciara spoke first. "Nothin' doin' fuh just sittin' around," she said. "Me an' my sistuh, we're thinkin' we're gonna set off and explore this creepy city. They've left us alone, so we may as well do sumthin' with our time, right? Anybody with us?"

[Freezair]

Several of the captives pulled closer together, but three of them--a wiry human man, a burly Evren woman, and an anthropomorphic Dalma--stepped forward.

"I agree," the Dalma said. "That creature was able to carry us through the water, and we were somehow able to survive. Maybe it did so with a charm or something similar. We might be able to find it and use it to escape this place. Especially since they just sorta... left us here..."

"I just wanna punch whoever decided to do this in their fat face," the Evren said. "Ain't nobody messes with Hilda and gets away with it!"

"I just don't want to die down here," the human man said. "This is supposed to be a routine trip; I don't want my boyfriend wondering for years what happened to me."

[Freezair]

"Then it's settled," Ailbhe said. "Everyone who doesn't wannuh go lookin', yuh can stay here," she said. "This trip is optional. Everyone else! Let's split up. Me 'n' my sistuh will stay togethuh, but maybe the rest o' youse can split."

The Dalma raised his hand. "Hilda, can you come with me? I'm an engineer, not a fighter. I'm pretty sure you could slug the living daylights out of anything if we get jumped."

"Happy to help, toots," Hilda replied. "I think Calvin here can handle himself, though. Right, Cal?"

"I'll do my best," Calvin said.

Quietly, the sisters were happy the crew were all familiar enough with each other to work something out. It saved them a lot of mental gymnastics.

[Freezair]

"Awright," Ciara said. "Does everyone here have some kinda watch on 'em? At least a watch that's still workin' aftuh all we went through?"

All of the would-be explorers nodded.

"Right," Ciara said. "I know it's gonna be hard tuh navigate in this place we dun know very well. But let's try 'n' meet back here in... two hours? Mebbeh three?"

"Three sounds good," Calvin said.

"Right. Three hours. Then we come back, if we can. Agreed?"

"Aye-aye!" the explorers chanted.

"Aye-aye," Ailbhe added. "C'mon, sis. Mebbeh this place is creepy, but it's sumthin' new to learn about, right?"

Ciara admitted she had to smile. "Right."

"Let's go."

"Let's go," Ailbhe echoed.

[Hunt Complete]