Just remember, darling, all the while. You belong to me.

~ Rome was not built in a day ~

Okay, she was definitely not going to be dumb. She wanted, no needed, to know what was going on, what the secrets of this cave were and what the water held. She, however, did not want to see anyone hurt, they could be useful in the future when she had further questions or quests for them to do but they would definitely not be useful if this giant moving rock thing got a hold of them. "Everyone run! Or hide! I need you." Dumb meat blob and its dumb need for constant food and its dumb shouting with its dumb voice. Just a big ol' blob of dumb. The winged creature and snake thing had the right idea, though not very graceful.

She felt like they would have to get to the dam at some point, two areas of interest: the river - where does it go, where does it come from - and the dam - what does it do, why's it there - however, did these rock things come alone or were there more? She had never seen just one rock by itself before. Whatever it was they would have to get rid of it (them?) or come back when it was sleeping. Probably best to come back when it slept... Did rock sleep? She didn't think rock could move but it obviously was, unless they were all in some vision thing, but they didn't share her vision when she had one before. Everything was so gosh darn confusing!

She tried again, directing all her focus on a large stone, or was it a crystal? She swore she could see slightly glowing parts but its was mostly just rick hard stone, and then imagines it flying through the air and straight at the golem. It honestly shocked the markings off of her when she actually saw the stone rise and launch through the air towards the golem, she aimed straight for where she thought its heart might be but whether she hit that area she didn't pay enough attention to notice for her tiny little legs were already backtracking and attempting to run backwards. "Ahaha, take that!" A quiver of fear in her voice. Though her eyes remained on the moving golem she tried to make sure she knew where everyone else was in the cave, hopefully Glaive was taking the meat thing far away and the big brown speared guy would take his own advice. For now though she didn't stop moving backwards, continuing to put as much distance between the golem and herself as possible.

If nothing stopped this thing she was definitely going to book it, she could come back later and maybe get Glaive to swim through the river and get the not-as-fluffy-as-her brown thing to clear the way to the dam. But that was later, right now she was on the verge of running very far.

Akaari is going to flee next round if they don't get the golem to stop coming towards them.

AHA, so she had figured right! The nugget was hungry and they were gonna get it some fish! Rocks weren't good for eating, no, no! Rocks were very bad tasting. Kaimana knew this for... undisclosed reasons.

She didn't have much time to bask in the triumph of her own good idea, though, because that nugget was coming towards her, screaming FIIIIISH at what felt like the top of whatever it had that could be considered "lungs" (which, honestly, Kaimana would've done the same). And, okay, while that was frightening, what was more so was what was following behind the nugget.

Aha. She was in danger, wasn't she?

Whatever the giant moving rock planned to do didn't really matter, because it was HUGE, and it was MOVING TOWARDS HER. And the nugget. The both of them! It was like being chased down by Glaive, except without the promise of pets. So, in other words, it was all terror and no fun. Lovely. Lovely lovely lovely. Time to go then!

The rambler called for everyone to run or hide, which seemed like a pretty good call at this moment. Kaimana figured for a moment that if she ran, the nugget might follow in the hopes of fish (valid). Was Glaive bringing the fish? She hoped Glaive would bring the fish. But if the nugget followed her, and the rock followed the nugget, the rock would be following HER. If the nugget followed the fish, the rock followed the nugget, the rock followed the FISH.

Hm....

GLAAAAAAIVE, GET FISH!" she yelled, panic starting to rise in her throat as adrenaline kicked in and she begun running in the opposite direction of the giant rock. If Glaive got fish then Kaimana's life would be accounted for, but what about the nugget's?

Running for your life was a really bad activity to strategize to, so Kaimana would just keep running, and really, REALLY hoping Glaive would get that fish.

OOC: Kaimana is attempting to flee from the golem and to call on Glaive to get some FISH yo
@Glaive @Effluvium ((Kaimana's attempting to interact with y'all so tagged ye))

Hoo-wee, that was a lot of noise! Everybody was hollering at the golem, the golem was making quite a ruckus by moving, Kaimana was demanding fish to solve the problem even though I don't think that'll work??? The nugget couldn't move any faster than it was! The thing was cruising. Everybody else was fleeing the scene, but Glaive couldn't just leave her stumpy-legged pals hanging.

Oh, wait, the cub was tearing off in a different direction. Okay, stumpy-legged pals was singular now. That was way easier to focus on. The spinosaurus couldn't possibly bring herself to pick up the pile of rotten-smelling meat, though, so a grab-n-go was off the table.

Baby blues squinted at Effluvium and then the golem's... face-rocks. Maybe there were eyes up there? That's why it was so fixated on just this nugget. Maybe it couldn't see very well!

Glaive shuffled forwards with a series of chirps and squeals, "heyyyyyy! Heyyyyyy!" Snapping her jaws a few times, her flanks twitched and took on an extremely fluorescent hue. All of her markings were intact, but it was like they'd been replaced with the CMYK spectrum.

"Heyyyyy, look at me! I'm a fish!" she called, and then started for the river looking over her shoulder. She could barely resist the urge to stop and scratch herself, though. Changing colors made you itchy!

@Effluvium

Effluvium shook itself out, standing once again. It sneezed, but its eyes were locked on Glaive. Glaive said she was fish. And Glaive was flashing. Bright colors. It reminded Effluvium of shimmering fish scales in the water. But there was one problem. Effluvium didn't think not-foods were fish. But Glaive said she was fish. If Glaive were fish, did that mean Effluvium could eat Glaive? Effluvium had never eaten a talker before.

The ground shook with the thump of stone behind it. Effluvium turned its head back to snarl at the golem following it. It was settled then. Glaive was fish. Effluvium had fish now. It didn't want the golem anymore. It especially didn't want the golem to take its fish. It was following Effluvium to take Effluvium's fish, Effluvium realized. Effluvium knew that's what it wanted. It bared its jaws at the golem.

The others may have been scared, but Effluvium seemed entirely unaware of the danger it was in. It turned its attention back to Glaive. Effluvium wanted the fish before the golem could get to it. Effluvium broke out into a gallop for Glaive.

"FIISH!" It gurgle-roared. It managed to avoid falling over itself this time, and dragged its body to Glaive.

"When I speak."

When I think.(Will never be used)

Haven squawked and tried to catch the snake, relieved that he caught himself before throwing herself into the air, this time making it.

What the Hell is that thing? she thought, flapping wildly to get up into the air. It was big, and noisy, and so was everyone else. She swooped down to follow the others, and could only hope that Electrum followed with his weird rock.

"Forget the fish!" she cried out to the others, "We have to run, fly, or stop that thing! If anyone has ideas, speak up now before we're trampled!"

As most of the Gembound scattered, Akaari's thrown stone smacked into its chest. It was a heavy rock, briefly staggering the creature, and it paused. While normally a use of magic like this would only attract its attention, something about this particular rock drew it. A crystal--with innate magic remaining?

It picked this stone slowly up, adding it to its own cluster of boulders, and then slowly turned to trundle back toward the Golem Dam.

The Gembound were free, for now, to further investigate Polaris' waters.

@Effluvium @Electrum @Haven @Akaari @Glaive @Sergei @Kaimana @Binh

Well... that worked. It wasn't even a gamble, just dumb luck! She guessed that it wouldn't last for long. Even she grew bored at staring at rocks after a while.

Landing, she checked on Binh, sighing when she realized he was okay. Looking up, the dragonet swallowed.

"... So, what are we doing?", she finally asked, rather lost.

In all the chaos of Fornax, she'd completely missed the purpose of their journey here. Not even Electrum had give her a hint of it, having been caught up with his weird rock. She could only wait for an answer before proceeding, brows furrowed.

Thankfully, somehow, their plan had worked. Glaive hadn't... brought fish per say, but the diversion had seemed to work out okay. Kaimana didn't really know all the details, she'd been busy running for what may have been her life.

Now all that was left were the tough questions that needed the definitive answers. They were here, with they 'key' and the information. Where to start? Kaimana pondered. "Water." Hadn't the rambler said something about being in water, whatever enigma they were looking for? "We look for water, yes? Key. Place to put key... in water?" Kaimana looked around. Was any of this making sense? Would any of them look for water? Kaimana still didn't really understand they concept of 'keys' or why they were better than pets, she still had to find out.

Effluvium had made it to Glaive. It seemed completely unaware of the preceding events. Or even that it'd been in danger. Like. At all. The golem wasn't following it, so it had the fish all to itself. It licked an eye, like an overgrown meaty gecko.

"Fish," Its voice welled up. Glaive wasn't flashing again. There was a brief dilemma if Glaive was fish since Glaive talked. But Glaive said it was fish. Fish was still fish. And fish was food.

It padded closer, and attempted to wrap its jaws around Glaive's leg. A test bite, to see if Glaive tasted like fish. It wouldn't be particularly powerful or painful yet. But it would certainly feel pretty gross.

"When I speak."

When I think.(Will never be used)

@Glaive (( the nasty is attempting to interact))

... throwing a rock to it worked? Like tossing a bone to a dog... ? Glaive's colors flared brighter out of confusion, as she twisted to stare over her shoulder as the golem bumbled away. Well, no need for this - ! and her natural hide crossfaded back on. Maybe, they couldn't see after all?

"Water." The whelp looked forward again, baby blues staring down her obnoxiously long snout to blink at Kaimana: go on? Indeed she did, too; looking for water wouldn't be too hard, considering Glaive'd just been running for it. A place to put the key, though... ? Definitely what they needed to find. She'd just been about to offer herself up for it, too, when - "ack?!"

Effluvium's jaws suckling on her ankles didn't hurt at all, actually, but it was just surprising and gross enough to elicit an "ouch" and a few, frantic, "hey, HEY!" Glaive's jaws popped with the calls, and she jerked her leg to get it free. "Why're you eating me? I'm not really a fish! I eat fish!" Because she was a FISHER-DRAGOOOOOON!

Her head tilted warily back towards Kaimana, and you could practically imagine the aaaaanyways going through her mind with the motion. "I'll look in that river! You guys hold the key-thing in case I don't find anything," she offered. Then, without even waiting for an answer, lumbered towards the crystalline river, took in a deep breath, and straight-up tumbled off the side of it and underwater.

It would seem she'd miscalculated the steepness of it, but that was a problem for Glaive in about thirty minutes. For now, she was calling on her magic to banish every bit of shadow from sight, even if her natural underwater eyesight was keen enough.