Masks 2

Finn - getting sick of being covered in blood, and mostly being out of danger - pulls out her gun. It's not special or anything - not a magical megagun. Just. Just a standard hand pistol. Just a fuckin' glock. And starts shooting at the things harassing them with that.

"Aye, I tend tae not like my bodies like I like my wings... we should make some progress. Stickin' around the corpse pile's never been a great idea."

She keeps her sword at the ready, prepared to fight whatever comes next....

Ken just moves forward. He isn't afraid of no ghost or fishman.

The group continued onward...

As Zil walked by one of the skinless fishmen, it suddenly jumped up and wrapped itself around her, trying to suffocate her! She shot fire out reflexively, burning it off.

At the same time, a clam lunged at Theraea who blasted it back with telekinesis.

Together, the group DID manage to get through the trapped hall of death by burning and throwing aside the now-spotted traps. Eventually, they started to approach the front steps of the Botanical Garden.

And sitting on the steps was...

[Don't post til Kadis posts!]

Sitting on the steps, singing softly along with the strange tones of the psionic voice, was Siren. The local small-town hero, superhero vlogger, and one-time flooder of half of Texas, just as she'd been in her last appearance thirty years ago!

Well. Sort of.

Her limbs didn't used to be that long, and her skin didn't used used to be so slimy. Big, red, raw looking gills flapped in her neck. Her old flashy white pageant girl costume had been replaced with ragged, scaly robes. covered in veiny black runes. She sort of glowed, and whatever she was singing was laced with psionics.

Plus she had big ol' shark teeth.

Siren didn't notice them approaching at first. She kinda seemed like her mind was elsewhere, singing and combing her long matted hair with webbed fingers.

Esen sees the Siren and shudders again. She looks like she's about to say something but then stops, noticing that the glowing fish-lady didn't seem to react to their approach. She drops into a crouch and readies herself to strike as soon as shit starts going down.

Sam's, like, already leveling his gun.

He's probably aware of Siren and all but, in the middle of this fishpocalypse, his brain is just registering her as another dangerous fish monster.

Someone should PROBABLY stop him if they want to have some nice pre-boss-fight chatter.

MARIA WILL DO THAT. She put a hand on Sam's GUN ARM, shaking her head. She also makes a motion to everyone that they should start spreading out. Partially because pre-boss-chatter was what certain unknowable forces lived for, and also because like, if she caught on that they were there already and in a perfect "trident team champion 2018" murderable formation, it might, like, be bad.

Before she had a chance to run off though, Maria removed her helmet, and put it in the Demon's hands.

The only thing Sam shot was a curious look to Maria, but, as in, legitimately curious, not knowing why he shouldn't shoot this obvious fish cultist monster.

Still, he slightly lowered his gun, letting it rest in a position where he could easily snap it back up and shoot.

The Demon took the helmet from Maria and immediately began looking it over and enchanting it. At the same time, Nocturne looked towards Siren, then to Maria. He took a few steps away to the side, following Maria's lead.

She'd fought beside Siren before, and had been there last time all this eldritch crap came to the fore. She'd be taking the lead here.

La Chat did the same, as did Jim. His katana was prepared for anything...

Lady Light, though, kept near Maria.

Looked like they were doing non-lethal takedowns, this time. The sword would stay out; Finn would just have to be careful.

She snakes around the foliage, picking a nice little spot from which to pounce as hard as a shadowcat.

Maybe it was the moving around, maybe it was the new exciting brainwaves in the air, but something stirred Siren from her song. She kicked off the stairs and floated a few feet from the ground, a big happy shark grin speading over her face.

"You can come out now. It's okay!" she called, cupping her hand around her mouth. One of the perks of fishiness - you can talk fine underwater! "There's no more corp soldiers around - we won! You're safe here!"

The air bubble snakes around with everyone else as they get into however they WANT to get while this is going down, but doesn't expand into like, a proper bubble-bubble yet.

"... Won it for who, Siren?" Maria asked, and stepped forward, hand on the ol' knifebelt.

Siren’s eyes widened. “Whale, whale, whale! What do we have here!?” She giggled and kicked her feet, doing a little backflip in the water. “This is fintastic, I didn’t think any heroes made it out! I figured the corps would have had to krill you all to mussel in like this! Y’all must be the new fry in school, I don’t recodnize…”

Then Siren saw Maria, and the headache started again.

She opened and closed her mouth for a few times like a glubby fish as she tried to connect the face in front of her with the vague shimmery remnants of her memories. This was… someone important. Someone super cool. Someone she’d met before in a patch of her past that felt mostly like buzzy static. Hmm…

A name bubbled to the surface. “Coyote?”

Seeing little miss thing from a hundred years ago turned into some horrible fishmonster? Pretty bad, not her favorite, the whole city of coral bones wasn't great either, those boneless people would haunt her for the rest of her unnaturally long life if she made it out of this- but the puns? Chills a bitch to the bone.

Nah not really they were pretty great but like, it wasn't any kind of time or place to appreciate them. Not until we were all fish.

"In the flesh, under Rainwalk, again." Maria sighed, and honestly? Wasn't lookin' too hot. It's a bitch to look a sweet fish kid in the creepy eye. "Not everyone died. Thought you did. Didn't seem the type to go into hiding. But I guess... I guess I didn't check, did I? Wonder what happened. But I can't catch up on the... Grand works..." She looked behind Siren, to the uhh. The beautiful architecture, and back. "If your friends are gonna murder us."

Sam suddenly had a stronger headache, and he wasn't sure if it was due to psionics or the onslaught of fish puns.

"Oh!" Siren honestly looked like she had completely forgotten the army of fish-horrors. "Oh no, the seacurity guys didn't give you any trouble, did they? They'd never do it on porpoise! We just got clear of the corps, like, reel reefcently, and they must've fishstaken you for anemones. Here!"

She closed her eyes for a moment, and the runes on her robes began to pulse like veins. A psionic blast emanated from her. The fish army went still.

"I'm just so glad y'all came, and... well, that you made it. I thought I was gonna have to do the whole revoluseaon on my own!"

"Well," Finn says, standing up - after all, wasn't much point stealthing if they'd already been detected. "I'd rather a revolution that c'n be teelivized. By the sounds of it, yers would be too busy drownin' the lot of us an' makin' us horrbubble fishy basterts tae really give any chance fer tha'. Siren - ye were a hero, once. I own like, five of yer runs - what th'fuck happened tae ye? Who're ye fightin' fer?"

"geeeerrk"

Sam wavers a bit as if he had been socked in the jaw. He quickly steadies himself and waves off worried looks.

"I'm fine, fine, just... Godblob beyond reality, it's been a while since I've been exposed to puns of this depth- dammit, intensity! I meant to say intensity!"

He lowers his gun to tighten his bandana.

"Damn fish magic must be gettin' through to my brain, someone tell me if I start growin' fins."

People grabbing at Zil doesn't make her happy. Especially when she's still carrying an injured friend. She's fully on the defensive, even as the rest of the group starts to talk to this...this...person. Certainly a person still, even if she's not what she used to be. A distorted simulacrum, or the creature that once was Siren...either way, Zil's teeth are grit.

"I echo Finn. What's going on and why do you feel this is necessary?"

The Demon, finishing whatever she was doing to the helmet, handed it back to Maria with a nod.

Siren's confused. The celebration should have started by now. She listens for their thoughts, doing her best to project good feelings back. "We're fighting for us! Obviously," she says, momentarily forgetting to keep the fish puns up. Still a rookie. Can't even stick to a shtick. "No more corps - carps! And thanks to the Voice we're strong enough to finally get rid of them for good!" Gotta show them HOW GREAT FISH REALLY ARE!

That's right! The Voice! "Oh my glubbin' gosh, I never eelven introduced you guys!!!" Siren gestured excitedly around her at... nothing? The whole city? Who knows. "Praysenting, the Fishous Fighter, the Fintastic Friend, the one and only Doom of Rainwalk - which was, like, a pretty cod-danged mean name for us to give - The Voice of the Deep!"

At that, the whole city shakes!  The floor tilts and a cloud of silt fills the water, making it hard to see. For just a moment the reef-garden-disaster flickers, instead showing bare walls covered in writhing black tentacles, as the psionic song increases to an out-of-key roar. 

Then it's all gone, and the rumbling under the city ceases. Siren beams! "Ask Coyote about it. They met one time!"

Finn struggles to steady herself.  Once the roaring ends, she draws her blade.

"That's the name o' yer god, then, aye? Coulda just skipped tae that part. Yer not fightin' fer common folk. Yer fightin' fer whate'er abomination is waitin' fer us below - and I'm not buyin' it. Ain't exactly one fer moralizin', but I'm not about tae hail th' sorta Satan what makes people scaly monsters an' uses 'em as cannon fodder. I'll take the teen-rebellion sort o' Satans instead. Get yerself a better devil - or better yet, get a hold oystyerself! Yer better 'n this, Siren! Kids still go 'round with yer merch!! D'ye wanna disappoint all them?! Nae! We can beat these basterts t'gether! WITHOUT bowin' tae some dark gods! Ya don't got tae throw the guppy out wit' the bathwater!!"

Sam shakes his head, looking pale.

"Nuh uh, nuh uh. I ain't signed up for tentacles today. Tell yer friend to slow his roll."

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Spoiler

... Should they have tried drawing her out, instead of coming down to meet her? Should they have done that? That seemed a lot wiser, now that everybody could see the whole uhh. The old pal. That guy. Mister Mega Millipede. Haha.

Gaaaaah. Even Maria is afraid! One can tell by the way she looks even briefly away from Siren, and the dinner plates just laying there on her face, and the way she tenses up. Her gaze snaps back to the familiar face, as she retrieves her helmet. "... Yeah, think I recall. It was a real creep. Had a taste for power, and friend-flesh. Almost killed everyone who had your back, and would have kept us from containing the AI, all for... God, what was it even for? Don't think Nimue's such a bad judge of character. Since when was Doom not fitting?"

"No, no, no. We had it all wrong back then." This wasn’t going well. "Sea, it was just trying to give us an opportunaty to stop all this corp nonsense before it even happened. I felt like, super gillty when it explained," she admits. God that was embarrassing. She’d been a big brat. "I was actually really rude about it? So, thanks for giving me so much time to learn the Deep’s side of things!"

"I was, uh. Rude to you guys too. I’m reel sorry." While she was apologizing. "When I first got back to Earth I didn’t look for any of you. I bassumed you guys must all be dead if the corps had been able to take over - cause like, heroes stop that kinda thing? But now I get it!" she added quickly. "The Deep was right. They’re just too strong. What we need ain’t a rebellion, it’s a reset." To something much, much older.

"But, um, not gonna lie. A few folks doplphinately might not make it out of saving the world. The Deep says it’s just like flooding Texas though, right? Like we agreed back then. Once you mullet over, y’all all know ya gotta krill a few Texans to humanity!"

Perfect logic. THAT OUGHTA DO IT.