middleofsomewhere | Deep Dweller: Conclusion

Deep Dweller: Conclusion

Victory

Deep in the desert, with the combined might and light of those working for Red and Orange teams a monster shatters. Not just any monster but the large, silver giant, shards melting away as they hit the sand.

A blast of energy, ripples from it, passing through Voidtreckers harmlessly but shattering any monsters that managed to survive the final battle.

In the laboratory it is the same story, monsters shattering and crumbling both inside the facility and outside. In the tunnels too, monsters crumble before Terran, Gry and Voidtrecker's alike.

Deep down in the cavern the combined might of those working with Purple and Blue, the Terran and the Gry has already cleared the cavern, with not one monster getting through to lay a claw on the Dweller.

There is a pause, another and yet another. No more monsters pour through the walls. Any monsters that somehow survived the blasting of light from those fighting at both entrances crumble now. Everyone in the cavern will feel a deep sated peace fill them. The terror and fear those in the Gry caverns had been feeling fades into deep satisfaction.

There are no words, but there is definitely a sense of gratitude, a thank you of emotions. The Gry are more vocal in their thanks, antennae waving and reaching out to stroke at Voidtrecker and Terran hands alike. Soon the older Gry gather the younglings and they circle the Burrower, the Terran take their leave respectfully, ushering any Voidtreckers out, leaving the Gry to their god.

It's a long climb up, for any who don't simply use their SCA to return to the train.

Meanwhile...

Those in the Terran tunnels, helping to clear up and rebuild after the chaos of the week may hear something interesting on the news that is spoken about.

A number of Terran had been found in various places around the world, in the desert, unconscious and injured. Assumed to be victims of all that had happened they had been taken to various hospitals. Yet the first couple had woken up, claiming to be scientists from the surviving lab.

How they had gotten to the desert is unhelpfully sumerised as activated alien technology to escape their besieged facility but there is much rejoicing and relief from Terran, a renewed hope that those missing may be alive, somewhere in the world. Even if the question of how they got there is on everyone's lips.

Both the Terran and the Gry who remained in their caverns are in high spirits, thankful to those that helped.

Return of the Voidtrecker.

All teams return to the Voidtrecker Express. The holographic message comes with helpful pick up point dots on their maps.

The Voidtrecker swoops through the air, landing gracefully on a set of railway tracks and approaching an area just outside the research facility, close enough to both there and the battleground where red and orange had fought for both teams to board.

Once everyone is onboard it speeds towards the tunnels. It picks up first those in the Gry caverns, followed by those in the Terran city and finally stopping to collect anyone climbing from the tunnels leading to the Dwellers domain.

Once all Voidtreckers are accounted for it leaves the tunnels and flies off into the sky and back into the void.

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Victory:

At the end of the battle with the hug silvery monster, Curufin stands astonished at the efficacy of the combined attacks of the various light-spell casters -- including the lightening-wielders, Tidus, Light, and Reno -- along with the effects of Kaiba's floodlight, Rapunzel's glowing hair, and Eva Iden'no's pokemon with her fiery wings. Others were making it possible for the spell-casters to keep fighting, giving real support, Uta with his kagune, Venus/Minako with her energy blasts, Peter Parker with his webs, Fandaniel with his entangling plants, and 47 with his rifle. Of course, Curufin's vision spell was in there too, blasting the monster's eyes with a brilliant imaginary sun that may have been a neutron star. But the spells didn't worked instantly, and it took at least half an hour of fighting the big monster while fending off the smaller ones at the same time. He wasn't sure it would work at all.

But it did. The boss monster exploded into pieces and its death throes released an explosive wave of energy that destroyed all the smaller monsters as it hit them.

Curufin doesn't linger long. He takes off running to find out if the monsters in the lab are being affected by this phenomenon. "Let's go check out the lab!" he exclaims to whoever is nearby, especially those he has worked with in the lab.

After the Victory:

Curufin makes a quick journey down the nearest hill to look for a stream. He promised Spark the cat that he'd look for fish. If there is any way he can find some, he'll do it. You can find him walking along with a makeshift fishing pole on his shoulder. (Actually, there aren't any aboveground streams.)

Return of the Voidtrecker:

Curufin hears the summons from the train and looks at his SCA to determine the nearest pickup point. He and his Orange Teammates and Red Team friends gather at the railway station outside the lab, talking and celebrating.

"Did you ever think we'd win that one?" he asks, laughing.

On the train after pickup:

Curufin saunters down the passageways, pretending there isn't a bloodstain on the left side of his jacket where the boss monster swiped him during the last battle. He'll be visiting injured friends and teammates in the Medical Coach soon, but right now he is avoiding that place. He has an aversion to admitting to injuries; he's had that since childhood. Right now, he's going off to quietly take care of the injury himself in his cabin. Feel free to call him out for his stubbornness and drag him off to see the healers!

Edited 2020-07-23 09:22 (UTC)

Victory

Della's not 100% clear on what exactly happened, but she doesn't seem to mind. The important thing is, they won and everyone's happy! That's all she needs. Happy as a clam, Della begins high-fiving everyone with both hands, laughing and shaking her fists.

"Way to go, everyone! We did it! Do we have time for a party?"

Train Departs

But when all is said and done, the moment Della is back on the train, she heads for the nearest chair and all but collapses into it. She's exhausted... but it's a good kind of exhausted. She smiles with a sigh.

"First mission, big success. Next mission... a nice long nap."

Victory!

Nita's barely able to stand in the wake of her latest spell (she's fine, she insists, though she'll let people hold on to her), and she does leave when the Gry wish to be alone with the Burrower.

But she does have questions, so when they're far enough away that conversation from the central cavern is muted, she puts a hand on that wall and says, eyes closed, Greetings and well met, elder cousin. If I may ask, what brought you here to this planet, these people?

It may not be the best time for questions, true, but she can tell it's the only time she'll get to ask them.

Return of the Voidtrecker

Nita opts to wait instead of just teleporting back to the train, trying to find where she's placed her balance and listening to the hubbub of those less tired around her. If anyone is.

When the train arrives, she gives it a stare. "You owe us a lot of explanation, you know that?" she says, though her energy's not nearly in it.

The Voidtrecker Express is saved from her snark for once!

Webmind himself is scratched and dinged in many a spot - he knows those will have to be fixed. But he is not exhausted, nor is he in danger of a trip to the Luggage car.

Not everyone is as fortunate, however, as is evident when he finally meets up with Curufin again and spots that bloodstain.

"Curufin, my friend," he says - deliberately pausing there, expression carefully neutral.

"Is there anything you need?" He does know how to, say, suture a wound, but he won't offer unless Curufin consents to receiving aid - and, in any case, it's not exactly sanitary enough for the procedure in most spots on the train.

Thankfully the mission hadn't lasted much longer after Gerome got injured. Inigo doesn't think he's ever felt as glad for the announcement that they should return to the train as he has right now, after sitting here next to Gerome for a short while. And sure, he could hit the SCAs and send them back the easy way, but.. he's pretty sure that might just weird Gerome out, or make him sick enough to throw up or something. It's not exactly something you should experience for the first time when you're already in pain - and thankfully the train is stopping close enough, in the city itself, that it's not too far of a walk.

But even a short walk was enough to make Inigo realise he couldn't just let Gerome keep walking around like that. Walking off a small wound is one thing, but the other seems to be in enough pain that it's worrying, even though Inigo can't tell what's exactly wrong aside from that cut on his leg. So after making sure Gerome is lying down on his bed and quickly telling him that he's going to get some help and that he'll be right back (mostly quickly so Gerome has no chance to protest this idea), Inigo is already running off to find a healer.

And there's one at the top of his head, considering Tidus was ~~whining~~ talking about healing people halfway through the mission.. so Inigo heads for Tidus' room first, banging his fist on the closed door.

"Tidus? .. Tidus! I swear to Naga that this is actually about something serious, so open the door! Please?"

Whatever makes the most sense to do after a mission is up to anyone else, but for Tidus, he headed over to his cabin after speaking to a few people, making sure Yuna was okay and when he couldn't think of what else to deal with. But then, it was that, not wanting to think about much else, and the grime and exhaustion of a week long mission clinging to skin and clothes that made him want to go and do nothing else. There'd be no point going for a shower when others would be heading there, and Tidus didn't care a great deal to fuss over getting in while someone was just getting out.

So Inigo is lucky in his Tidus finding abilities, lucky that his own low mood had him nowhere else but there. Opening the door and looking the same mess he'd been for most of the mission, though with a different shirt at least, a puzzle quizzing Inigo when Tidus finds him on the other side of the door.

"Inigo? What's up?"

What happened?

Kaiba is waiting for her when the train returns. He'd rushed to shower before the underground group returned to the train, so his hair is still damp and his uniform is slightly disheveled, but he's mentally checking off a list of ~~friends~~ allies as the underground group loads.

"Nita. Good to see you again. Final report?"

Nita's smile is weary, but triumphant.

"Mission accomplished, chief. No casualties."

At least not as far as she'd seen; she may have to check the Roster.

That smile doesn't hold, however, and gives way to a look of intent scrutiny.

"... You've gotten healing since your battle, right? I mean, if I weren't wiped I'd offer regardless, but-"

She knows where that tactic leads.

"If I'm not dead asleep in half an hour, we'll debrief, how's that?"

If they weren't both asleep.

Oh, that's familiar. Kaiba shifts from foot to foot, glancing to the side briefly.

"Cleaned and bandaged, not thick or deep enough for stitches. Nothing that won't heal with time." He rolled his shoulder and sighed. "You know how restricted we are for medical. But what about you?"

Absently stepping out of the way so other people can get on, she nods.

"If you need a touch-up to speed things up later, let me know then."

That seems an acceptable middle ground.

"As for me... most of the stress is mental, though it helps all that residual fear from the Burrower is gone."

She didn't lose an arm to the monsters or anything; if she's gotten any severe bruising or the like she's too wiped to feel it right now.

"What happened on your end? Any last-minute surprise gifts from space?"

Once Gladio had gotten back to the train, he knew he really, really wanted a shower. But since those were all full and there was a line a mile wide for each of them, he ended up getting himself a bowl of water from the kitchen and carried it back to his cabin.

He peeled his flight suit off down to his waist and sat down to examine the injuries he'd sustained during the mission. The ones he could see anyway.

They looked worse than they were. Dried blood caked most of his arm and the bite itself had dried up as well. He sighed and, after having taken his towel out of his cubby, he dipped an end into the bowl of water and began to clean himself up.

"Living like that for a week...no wonder."

Kaiba reaches up to rub at his head, flicking the hair out of his eyes. He looks like he could use a nap too, honestly.

"We did. A massive creature attacked with several of its ugly friends, and the fighters held it up as long as they could. The mechanics managed to repair a massive floodlight from the lab and used that to stun it, but we weren't fast enough to prevent a pile of injury. Luckily, it seems everyone survived."

Nita nods, still too fatigued to be too grim, but not sounding all that relieved either when she says,

"We're doing a headcount, right? Haven't seen my sister all week; just figured she was keeping to herself over where you guys were."

And S'reee, for that matter.

"Yugi IS okay, though; Tidus told me to keep an eye on him."

Injured, yes, but overall okay; Yugi would have to handle that discussion himself.

1. Post Mission, Part 1

[It’s not until after she was back on the train that it all hit Masumi that this was actually happening. Before, she’d been trying to hope that maybe she could go home soon, or had been too focused on the mission to really think about being caught up in all this, but now she was being smacked in the face with the realization that she was really stuck here, on a voidtrain traveling to other worlds, and unable to return home.

Needless to say, she wasn’t handling it well, and was making a beeline for the training car to take out her frustrations. Care to talk to her?]

2. Post Mission, Part 2

[Later on, during what was presumably night, Masumi found that she couldn’t sleep. Maybe it was because she’d ruined her entire sleep schedule to avoid getting attacked by monsters, maybe it was her lingering discomfort, but either way she got up and started heading up the train for...she wasn’t really sure where exactly she was going. She just knew that she didn’t want to stay in her cabin right now.]

"I haven't seen her either," Kaiba reported grimly. "I'll keep an eye out, and we can check the roster."

But Nita's next words had a profound effect. His shoulders sagged as the tension left them.

"Thank you. I'll have to thank him too."

Kaiba looks fairly dead on his feet, but he manages to spare a smile for his ~~friend~~ leader. He adjusts his bag over his shoulder, wincing a little. Those hard floors had not been kind.

"What's the plan when you board? Shower and sleep for a week?"

Curufin turns around and sees that Webmind has his own battle wounds. For the moment, he says nothing, though he will soon.

"Erm. . . what would I need?" He sees the direction of Webmind's glance, so it's too late to put his arm casually over his side and attempt to cover up the the blood. So he looks down at the bloodstains as though seeing them for the first time. "Oh, you mean this?"

Curufin looks a little concerned for Kaiba. ~~Formality not necessary! Curufin considers them friends.~~ Obviously Kaiba has bumps and bruises.

"The plan? Yes, something like that. I could use a hot shower and a very long nap! How about you?"

"Good. That's something, anyway."

She grinned.

"You really should have seen him when we were fighting; that dragon he had with him... was that yours?"

Webmind has, in his multitude of minutes since first awakening, learned the power of intentional silence.

Staring at Curufin's injury, he's just going to employ that power now.

"..."

[Welcome to the ranks of the not-sleepers on the train, Masumi! When she happens upon the Quiet car, she'll find Webmind lingering there, not far from the repurposed booth that is Tony's workshop.

The robotic Voidtrecker doesn't appear all that shocked by her restlessness, however, and gives a cheerful little wave.]

Hello! You are one of those we received at the newest platform, correct?

[A smile-emoticon flashes on his screen.]

My name is Webmind. May I have yours?

If any topic could make Kaiba smile, the Blue Eyes could. He noticeably puffed up a little.

"Yes. My three Blue Eyes are my strongest monsters, and if he insisted on using those holograms to protect others, I had to give him one of the best. That card is a piece of me...I had to give him something to link us."

Kaiba shifts a little closer. He knows Curufin was actively involved in combat the entire time, and he likely needs some attention too. But he'll hold off for now.

"The same. I just...wanted to thank you, for all your help this week."

He's clearly not comfortable with this kind of conversation. He shifts from foot to foot again. But he tries his best to maintain eye contact.

Prompto had stopped to check on a couple friends on the way to his room. He didn't stay long, just a quick peek to make sure they were in one piece. Feeling relieved, he walked into his own room and stopped in his tracks seeing Gladio (for an entirely different reason than Gladio normally stopped him in his tracks half nude).

"Wha-" He stammered, completely horrified. "You said it wasn't that bad! You've been fighting all day with that?" He didn't normally question his friends, especially not Iggy or Gladio, but he couldn't help it right now.

He huffed and tossed his stuff in his bed above Gladio's (not that he ever slept there). Coming closer, he plucked the towel out of Gladio's hand. "Can you sit on the floor okay? Er- actually let me get you a pillow."

Edited 2020-07-24 04:53 (UTC)

Nita laughed, a little; she needed it.

"Well, you'll be getting that back in one piece too. For now, though..."

She sniffed.

"I think we both need a shower. And sleep."

And assorted other things, which would make themselves evident in time. And-

"And don't we still have those council nominations to go through?"

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Deep Dweller: Conclusion

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Nita OTA

On the train after pickup

closed to tidus + gerome

it says gerome and tidus, get out inigo

the train

Re: the train

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Closed to Prompto.

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return of the train

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"Who's been kidnapped now, Dair?" Nita will ask, once her sister's back.

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Post Mission 2

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Re: Closed to Prompto.

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