The Forgotten Zodiac

The portal dropped them into the worst place possible. It wasn't the Phantoms palace, nor was it a mountain. Nor was it anywhere in particular they knew, really. The portal dropped them in the middle of the Nordic River; it was a wide and deep river, and had a nasty undertow. As in, Verolen went under almost immediately after hitting the water. That nasty. He struggled to hold Arachne above the water, knowing that she would drown too if someone didn't take her.

But then there was Israel, Byrne, Verdi and Rush to take care of. Aries was a strong swimmer, apparently; she grew up swimming in swift rivers, so naturally, she was the first to get someone out of the water. The only reason she did so before Bermuda was the fact that she had already been holding poor little Verdi. She went back to the water immediately, having realized at once how serious this was.

Bermuda felt himself shift before he realized that they had landed in water. He twisted about, just in time to see Verolen go under, and dove after he and Arachne. He felt the current began to pull at him, and murmured something - the words were lost underwater. Instantly, the water immediately surrounding them slowed down, not becoming horrifyingly powerful to the others. Bermuda pulled Verolen and Arachne to the surface.

Eve had shifted into her serpantine form, sliding through the water with Byrne on her back. It seemed that the human had come around slightly, and was clinging to Eve's scales as she hurried to get him to the bank before he slid off. "Aries, get Israel!" Eve shrieked to the Veira. While Israel's wings usually helped to make him a strong swimmer, the siren was weak, and seemed barely able to keep his head above water.

"Where's Rush?" Bermuda yelled, dragging Arachne and Verolen to shore.

Aries grabbed the Siren at once, pushing herself to shore with powerful leg strokes, dragging Israel with her.

Rush was further downstream already. His wings could be seen desperately flapping at the surface here and there, but his wings had already become waterlogged and heavy, dragging him down easily. He had lost too much blood from the arrow, and he was severely weakened, like Israel. Aries pointed him out to Bermuda, staring at the waters, expecting him to splash around more. Nothing happened.

Bermuda dove under after Rush, looking around for the Chimera. He quickly located him, and hurried over as fast as he could. They had to get out of the water, who knew what else was in it...

And of course, there was indeed something else in the water. Bubbles rose up without warning, and there was a sudden scream as the river moved oddly and Rush came to the surface again. What emerged with him looked like...well, like a giant jellyfish, to be perfectly honest. Rush was wrapped up in its coils, twitching erratically whilst struggling to stay afloat. The fish dragged him back down, but not before he managed to scream again. Another rush of bubbles, and he was gone again, the black water swallowing him up.

Israel, now on shore with Verolen, shrieked. Bermuda dove after the jellyfish, trying to think of something he could do. He'd left his staff on shore when he'd put Verolen and Arachne there, so he didn't have many spells anymore... what could he do?

Eve slid back into the water, following Bermuda. "Aries, stay with the others!" she called back.

"Got it," Aires waded out of the river, pulling Israel along next to her. She turned and looked back at river, concern across her face.

The jellyfish followed the flow of the water, lazily swimming without much aim. It wasn't any more intelligent than any other jellyfish; it just drifted along without aim, waiting for food to slip into its grip. Namely, Rush, who was now wrapped up quite firmly in its tentacles, limp with a little blood leaking into the water from the corner of his mouth. He was still twitching here and there, but completely unconscious.

Bermuda darted after the jellyfish, slipping between the tentacles with practiced ease. Getting is was one thing, but getting out with Rush intact would be another. He gripped onto Rush, creating a bubble around his mouth so that the chimrea could breathe while Bermuda tried to figure this out.

Rush coughed water up almost at once, though he remained limp and unconscious. The jellyfish continued to drift along, carried by the current that was quickly picking up as Bermuda's spell wore off. Blood started to fill into the bubble already, the flow picking up as one of the tentacles draped itself over the back of his neck.

Bermuda kept the spell up, trying to filter the blood out of Rush's air. He grabbed onto one of the jellyfish's tentacles to see if he could pry the Chimera free, but pulled back with a yelp. That hurt...

Rush wasn't much of a help, being unconscious and whatnot. There was a sudden shift from Bermuda's left, however, and a massive tentacle reached out from the dark depths of the water below; oddly enough, the bottom layer of the river was made of saltwater rather than the same freshwater of the rest of the river. Which explained why the jellyfish was here. But the other thing happened to be a giant squid, also fishing for dinner.

Bermuda let out a yell, which was muffled due to his being underwater. He grabbed Rush and frantically began to pull, closing his eyes as he expected to be grabbed.

Eve dove under the water, fangs bared at the squid. She sunk her teeth, laced with poison, into the squid's tentacle.

The squid let out a roar, shaking its tentacle around wildly. It smashed into the jellyfish, bringing it (along with Rush and Bermuda) to the river floor. It didn't hurt much, as the squid hadn't been trying anything, and the jellyfish comforted their blow somewhat. Said jellyfish, surprisingly, released Rush and billowed its frills once, propelling itself away with all due haste, fleeing far downriver before the squid could grab it.

Bermuda grabbed Rush and made a beeline for the surface. ((-highly distracted-))

Aries was waiting at the surface, helping Bermuda pull Rush to the shoreline. Once that was done, Verolen offered Bermuda his staff back so he could try and heal Rush somewhat. The stings were already swelling, white welts forming on puffy red skin. The blood leaking from his mouth (and now ears) came from the internal damage that the jellyfish's paralysis poison had caused. He was shaking uncontrollably and still twitching here and there.

Bermuda took the staff at once and began to heal Rush. Israel wrapped his wings around Arachne, half in trying to comfort her, half in trying to help Bermuda.

Rush gasped in pain once the poison was cleansed from his system. He let out a short wail before falling silent again, finding it very hard to breathe thanks to the welts and swelling on his throat. Verolen went back to Arachne and curled up around her, a tear slipping from the corner of his eye as he felt her stump of a leg. "We need to get out of here..."

"Then open the portal," Eve said, slipping back up to the shore. "Let's get out of here, before anything else bad happens."

Bermuda nodded, having just lifted his staff from Rush's neck. He patted the Chimera on the shoulder, then looked to Verolen. "Let's go."

"Right..." Verolen nodded, picking up Arachne and holding up his ether shard. The portal opened under his feet. It would drop them all right in the infirmary of the Manakete Palace, right where they wanted to be. Verolen's aim had been good enough.

Bermuda opened his eyes, expecting to be at their new temporary home...

Only to find that he, in fact, was home.

The Naiad looked around at the sandy beach they had landed on. Why had Verolen brought them here.

Then another thought hit him.

Verolen... had brought them to Oceanica?

This was bad.

Israel looked around, a soft gasp escaping him. "...home?" he said softly, looking around. This place did indeed remind him of home, even though his memories of here were foggy. At any rate, their new location did provide some comfort to the injured siren, who quickly reached to grab Verolen's hand.