Ocean Shadows Event

Livia watches in awe as their group meets Queen Corundum. He's grateful that Aborakota is by his side, and it gives him the courage to keep his body from shaking in the presence of so many others. He fights the urge to look around wildly, and then, it's over. He only caught the last bits of what Corundum said, with one phrase in particular sticking out to him. "Yeh want us to trust yeh? Work like one of us." He takes a deep breath in and turns to his companions. Livius looks as nervous as him, and Aborakota has lines of tension underneath his friendly visage. It's not everyday you meet royalty, he thinks. They move out of the way of the others who are mingling in groups, when a familiar voice sounds behind them.

"Hey there fellas! Wanna take a trip down to the crater?" Amlin says, strolling up beside them. 

Livia has to crane his neck up to reach her face, and he can't help but grin, "working like one of ya?"

She nods her head and grins, "Varsha is getting the gear ready, just in case you all said yes."

"But we have our gear?" Aborakota asks, confused. Livia nods his head in agreement and looks back at their acquaintance.

"Yeah, but this is additional stuff. Mostly mail plating with framing since you're all much squishier than we are. It's precautionary in case the local fauna get a little testy. We also have net bags to collect things we may find, and the primary reason we're going out there. So, will you three be joining us?" Amlin asks with a grin.

Livia finds his voice and practically shouts, "Yes!"

"I guess that settles it! Let's get going," Aborakota says with laughter in his voice.

***

Varsha holds out the protective gear to him, and he takes it carefully. Livia expects it to feel heavy, but is pleasantly surprised when it's lighter than cloth. Livius studies him as he puts it on while Amlin explains how it hooks around his body. Livia holds in a chuckle watching Livius' intense expression, imagining gears and wiring sparking. After he gets his on (the trickiest part being how to lay it over his neck feathers), the others got theirs on. Then comes the lights, and preparing the breathing gear. With a sigh, he notes how much faster it was for them. As he turns to say something to Varsha, Aborakota's tail flicks up and rubs underneath his chin. All thoughts leave his head as he turns to smile at the other toa. 

"Yes Kota?" he whispers near Aborakota's head.

Aborakota's breath is warm on his muzzle, "just want you to know I"m thinking about you."

A grin plays out on his lips, "well, I don't remember what I was going to ask because of that lovely tail of yours."

He looks up over Aborakota's shoulder, and sees Livius talking animatedly with Amlin and Varsha. They see him glance over and wave at them both to join them.

"Time to go," he says, nudging Aborakota's side.

***

The trip to the crater is mostly uneventful, aside from Livius' excited swimming and pointing at everything that caught his eye. Varsha does her best to explain things with hand signs. Then, as they near the crater, she signs for them to slow down and stick close to the rocks. The terrain underneath them starts to climb sharply, before dipping down. The currents tug at him, and he can see Livius struggling with the strong currents, and as he moves to help support him, he gets dragged by a deceptively strong current. Strong arms pull them both out of the current before they get smashed against rocks. As he moves to continue, that same arm smacks him up against the rock. 

Varsha looks at him and points up, then signs, head down.

He feels the shadow move overhead. Livia's blood turns to ice, and he resists the urge to look up. Within moments the great beast is gone. Varsha grins at him. On the other side of her he sees Livius with a look of awe on his face. He's going to write about this for sure, Livia thinks to himself with a smile. Amlin catches up to them with Aborakota, and they continue on to the wreckage area they were to pick through. Amlin points out a large smooth and oddly colored rock, and he remembers the directions she gave them before going in the water. That rock marked the start of this area, and if they got separated, to go back to that rock.

As they move around the rock he sees the wreckage of a tank. Seaweed danced from the barrel where it anchored, and parts of the tread. At first he thinks one large hole was rust from years being underwater, then he realizes the hole's edges are too regular, and don't have the right shape to be natural rust. Within seconds his brain catches up to what his eyes are seeing; a massive slaw or hand tore out the side of this tank. Small creatures swim in and out of the inner area.

Amlin signs, Groups Only, No Wandering.

They nod their heads. He sees Aborakota start picking through the silt and pick out something shiny. He swims over to look along with Livius. It's an odd shaped item, more scrap metal than anything, with sections that glow sporadically. He holds it out to Varsha to inspect.

She signs, Good For Repairs. 

Aborakota nods and tucks it into his bag. Livia focuses his gaze to the sea floor, to look for other odd scrap items or pieces of tech. They didn't have the means to bring anything particularly large at the moment, but they could flag the site for later retrieval. Medium-small items would go in Varsha and Amlin's bags. That was the plan, anyways. Knots of worry make themselves known as he combs through the silt. We're so far from everyone else, and if something were to go wrong... He shakes his head, forcing it to clear, focusing on the fact that they were okay now. That it would be okay. He focuses on the task, and nearly runs into a wall. Only, his muzzle touched it, and upon touching it, the half crumbled wall starts to light up, piercing the deep sea gloom.

Livia feels something focus on him, attention drawn by the bright light. He takes a shaky breath, then taps it, and the lights retreat like flowing water. His heart is still racing as Amlin comes up next to him and pats his shoulder. The presence fades back into the gloom as the lights dim. Amlin swims over head to inspect the crumbling wall. Aborkota comes up beside him, along with Livius and Varsha. 

Varsha signs, Touch Lights. Controls.

He mulls it over, what she was trying to say, when it clicks. It's a control board. That's why it reacted to my touch, he thinks. He glances at Livius, who has a similar look of realization on his face. Whatever this went to, must've been massive, he thinks. He sees Aborkota tentatively hold out a claw to the board, not touching it, but tracing the pathways the lights took. With a flick of his tail, he swims over it, towards Amlin. Then, Livia feels clicking in the water. He's about to sign something when the board shudders starts to shudder to life, then fades. Amlin swims over holding out a strange core of some sort, with a similar energy signature to what Paschara engineers used for the technology. 

Amlin holds it out for the two toas to look. Livia stares at the core in awe. It was beautiful with it's fractal edges, and graceful containment frame. The metal was barely touched by the corrosive properties of sea water.

Livius looks at it and signs, Power?

Amlin nods her head, For Everything.

Well, there's no way we're topping that. Maybe Corundum will trust us more if we bring back another power source for the kingdom's tech? he grins, thinking.

Amlin then tucks the core into her bag, and they continue going through their salvage area in a grid pattern, far enough apart that they weren't on top of each other, but close enough to react in under a second if need be. He body starts to ache as they load up their bags with scraps of rare alloy pieces, and other miscellaneous scrap that Varsha and Amlin assure them is useful. Livius asked once why they were grabbing it, and Amlin mimed a fire and tools. Reshaping what's there, he realized. After that Livius grabbed every piece large enough to not slip through the gaps in his net bag., and small enough for him to carry without over burdening himself.

After a couple hours, their bags are full to nearly bursting, and on cue, their tanks give an alert that half the oxygen was used. Amlin signs for them to head out. this time, they avoid the strong current going down one section of the crater wall, to avoid a repeat of him and Livius nearly getting turned into minced fish food. Varsha and Livius sign back and forth as they swim, having a more in depth conversation than Livia could follow in the gloom. As they crest the crater wall, his mind drifts back to that presence he felt when the control board lit up. The feathers on his neck prickle at the memory, and he shivers. He looks ahead, and swims quickly to catch up with the others, not realizing he stopped. 

I hope we'll get a short break before needing to come back out here.