When Kera had spotted a fat fire-alligator waddling in the same direction as she was going, she slowed down so that she could pad along next to him, though she did not speak until they reached Pisces. In her time of being... well, alive, she had gotten fairly accustomed to all the twists and paths the caves had to offer.

It was, however, fairly slow. Kera soon realised-- around halfway through tunnel N --that creatures like Dragon weren't made for walking on land. She didn't want to question why the hell he would come this far for wings when his natural habitat seemed to be places like Cetus that was full of water.

Pisces would be better for him, perhaps, where it had large bodies of water already.

Her first words to Dragon, once the scent of Pisces hit the roof of her mouth and she could feel water beginning to cling to her fur, were thus: "I don't think you're fat." Kera, of course, was more than aware that Dragon was on the chunkier side of gembounds.

"You said you knew the phoenix, Tenzin? How did you meet him?" She then asked as she moved across the cave floor, slow enough for Dragon to follow. She wandered, first, to the lagoon near the waterfall and craned her neck into the water to drink.

She then sat herself down, half-expecting Dragon to slink into the water. "What does he look like? Is he very big?" She asked, looking around for what she assumed was a giant blue bird.

@Dragon

Dragon huffed as he dragged his bad leg along behind the white wolf. He knew her, of course, so he had no real reason to bite her head off. Metaphorically speaking, of course.

"When we fought Raheerah! The great dragon. When the Betrayer exposed herself for the first time; when we saw what she was, the buzzing, tiny light monster," he rumbled. "Tenzin fought the flames with ice! He is a large--bird," Dragon decided, greatly underselling the phoenix. "I think it was blue and silver but it has been some time. He was protecting many. The stag was brown," he added wisely.

Most stags were brown, but never mind that.

"He had mushrooms on his antlers. We will find them, if they are there. Call them by name. And warn them-... Warn them it may be a trap. There are many who would lie! Like Nemean! And abuse others for their own gains... and the ill of all else."

Almost immediately upon arrival into Pisces, Dragon lifted his heavy head, and bellowed.

"TENZIN! PHOENIX. STAG!" he roared.

If there was one thing Dragon was good at, it was being loud.

Only then did he look around in the pitch black.

The alligator lay down, for a moment, silent, listening and watching. He then focused, blinking, trying to see through the darkness to visually seek anything that might be lurking--or a sleeping stag, perhaps. Strangely, he felt the gem at his chest respond--something that normally only happened for fire. The world around him shimmered, and abruptly, he could see even better than before--which, given his murk-adapted alligator eyes, was saying something.

Huh.

So-... This was Pisces, then. There was water here--which he might have greatly enjoyed--but it was cool, even cold, far too much for his cold-blooded body.

And he wasn't fat. What was wrong with being fat, anyway?!

@Kera

Kera listened for a moment, squinting at the water while Dragon spoke. She twisted her head around to him, eventually, opening her mouth to speak, but the alligator soon began roaring into the darkness.

As a dragon does, of course.

She did not know that most stags were brown. She'd only ever seen one, really. "Does the stag have a name?" She asked. "Or is he just... the Stag?" The pup pushed herself up at this, sniffing the ground, pacing for a moment.

It was dark, and Kera had a quest to get on with. "I'm going to make some lights," she offered towards Dragon before stepping away from the edge of the water, sniffing some more, then approaching a rock.

She focused, shut her eyes, and pressed her nose against it. The sensation of magic running through her veins was more than familiar to her, but she did not feel mushroom heads pushing against her face. There was, however, dim glowing light.

She opened her eyes. The medium-sized boulder had begun to glimmer golden-white, providing some light in the dark. Kera promptly decided not to question this new-found power as she stalked off elsewhere, tail wagging contentedly, to another dark corner of Pisces.

"Tenzim? Bird? Stag? Brown stag?" She called out as she went.

@Dragon

"I do not know. I do not think I heard it spoken," Dragon replied.

Lights, that was a good idea. In case the others followed--this way they could find them. Dragon didn't like the black wolf that had been in there, but the rest--the rest might just be useful.

"Do!" he agreed.

He, himself, started to slowly high-walk his damaged, heavy body nearer the water. The phoenix had used frost, after all--it stood to reason it might be near the water.

Plus, Dragon wanted to be near it in case his next self-appointed task when completely and utterly to hell.

He paused, slowly turning to peer back, to gauge the best way to return should he get lost in the darkness--and saw that the glowing light which Kera had created was, rather than blue-green fungus, this time a glowing rock.

He stared at this, for a time. And at length, he came to a conclusion.

Huh, he thought, and then moved on. He followed Kera part of the way, and then made his way to the water's edge himself. There he bellowed, again.

"Stag! Tenzin! Phoenix!" he roared.

Then, carefully drawing on his power, he attempted to blast a torrent of fire into the air. He was very, very careful to keep his jaws near the water, but this time his magic did not really respond. A tiny "poot" of flame, and he was left huffing at his failure.

@Kera

Watching. Listening. So many of them, here and then there; things happening, and equally, things not. They were colors to his mind, echoes, voices, feelings, thoughts—busying about far above him, always, always, always. And if it was too loud, there was the waterfall, a roar, a constant. But brightest of them still was his ruby. There were things it had done he did not agree with. They had grown apart. They had argued. It was strange for Tenzin to feel distress. And still, the ruby was brightest in the maze, gleaming like an answer he did not want to reach.

The hidden depth of the lagoon was still his icy retreat, its branch-like spiked defenses having been bloomed by the visiting Blacksmith not very long ago; but such a sight would forever be a mystery, the true depth of the lagoon unknown. It was not common for him to receive summons. In fact, he rarely ever heard his name. The phoenix had not surfaced since the fight with Raheerah, and he had been healing here since; but what could the gembounds need of him, that they would call for him by name? And also "stag"?

His eyes struggled to opened inside the ice-like chrysalis that contained him, cracking the frozen layer that had sealed them. Of what he could sense of the gembounds above, one of them was a child and the other was older. He focused on the older gembound for a moment. Tenzin had met this gembound in the fight with Raheerah, though not on a personal level. The phoenix was ready to sacrifice his being to save Astraea and the children, but he was lucky to survive—though that did not mean he was on good grounds with Nemean.

Why were they calling for him, then? Tenzin did not sense the fiery chaos of Raheerah, but perhaps the 'Brug had found a way to cloak itself against his seeking. Dawa was, indeed, still dead. Was there some other threat? He cracked loose other parts of his body, listening as they called for him again.

And again, for the stag. Was it so urgent? He began to feel anxious.

"I am here," Tenzin told them telepathically. "I must rise from the lagoon. It has been a long time. Give me a moment to break free of my healing shell."

"That's weird," Kera responded. "Everyone has a name, don't they?" She supposed that his name must have been The Stag, or The Brown Stag, or perhaps just Brown Stag, and that's why he didn't give an actual name.

Kera's logic was immpecable, as per usual, of course.

Her tail wagged slightly at Dragon's enthusiasm to her lights. She knew the lights were important and she was glad to see more than just her and Giggle excited to see more lights spawning across the caves.

She turned her head back to observe the baubled rock-- which, surprise, hadn't moved --glowing yellow in the dark, then looked towards Dragon calling out and spewing a small amount of fire. Not sure what he was trying to achieve with this, Kera continued.

She pressed her nose against a dark corner and focused. There was no more yellow light that came from her, she noticed. She felt the familiar shove of mushroom heads against her cheeks and brushing by her legs as eerie blue-green mushrooms began to sprout in a ring around her, supplying dim light to the dark corner she was in.

It was nice. She felt comfortable around the mushrooms she grew, and seeing their light begin to push back the darkness made her happy. She thought a lot about the Eyes and the Blackness that Giggle had talked about, in general. She worried. She wondered if light alone would be enough.

Staring at her mushrooms, bittersweet, her thoughts were interrupted by a certain something talking in there. Kera didn't know what it was-- she looked left, then she looked right, expecting someone to be speaking into her ear.

There was nothing.

She spun around, wide-eyed, looking towards-- "Dragon!" There was more concern in her voice as she edged closer to the alligator. She craned her head down, half-whispering quietly in fear of prying eyes overhearing. "Did you hear that?"

A part of her knew it was the phoenix-- or perhaps The Stag --but another part of her told her it was a trap. A nagging voice that told her it was a trap, that it was a Something That Lurked in Darkness that the brother-birds had sent them to. To die. For some, unknown, birds-shouldn't-be-trusted reason.

@Dragon

Dragon, too, listened to the voice. He slowly lowered himself down onto his belly, and thought about what he'd heard.

Lagoon? ...Healing shell? Ahh--YES! I remember, now! Others went to find him--long ago--and that is how they had found him, deep down and encased in... ice, had it been?

Dragon had not been there himself--this was, in fact, the first foray into Pisces in memory--but he knew of the place, knew what had happened, knew the details. He recalled taking the Children of Rot to the fight, soon after--and how well they had done! Even at the memory, faint pride swelled.

Czernobog, fiercely determined to the end. Ghanyarah, battling loyally despite his silence. Eve, even-... shouting her eardrums into bursting, but-... She'd tried.

BUT! Back to the present! The heavy black alligator shook himself from his musings and grunted.

"I did. I remember this, from before."

Dragon was not impatient, precisely, but he saw no reason, at least, to waste time. That-... and he did not want to force Tenzin out, if it were a trap laid by the galaxy-birds. And so, once more, he began to shout. He tried, this time, even to roar over the volume of the waterfall. ...He kind of managed.

"Three birds in the room of stars have become one!" he bellowed vaguely at the entirety of Pisces' water. "They seek a stone--red, blue and white--a bringer of life, they say; they claim the stag holds this! They offer wings, in return! I do not know if it is a trap! I do not know if they are truthful, or as the betrayer!"

He just assumed, naturally, that Tenzin would have every idea who "the betrayer" was.

@Kera

Dragon was good at being loud.

Which was good, if you were currently at the bottom of a lagoon.

Less good, if you were a wolf right next to his maw.

Kera groaned faintly, though she sank herself down onto her belly as Dragon did, alert, watching the water with a frown. She wondered, briefly, how far back before was and if Tenzin would recgonize Dragon.

She hoped he himself wasn't some betrayer-bird. To Dragon, she offered, "most birds are betrayers," in a gentle, solemn voice, recalling both Aka and the goose. "Why is he at the bottom of the water, anyway? Why isn't this his first time at the bottom of water?"

Kera knew exactly one certain thing about birds, and it was that they couldn't breathe underwater. Maybe. Owls can't, at least. After a moment of consideration over Dragon's bellowed words she lifted her head and shouted over the roaring water, "The betrayer is Nemean!"

Just in case, of course.

Slowly, the pieces of his ice-chrysalis shattered and broke around him, and eventually he was free of the prison he made for himself. It had been nearly two years since he sunk himself to the bottom of the lagoon, but that time was nothing for one that had lived for ten thousand years.

He was free, but not fully healed. He had taken the full hit of dragon's fire and nearly died, he remembered the claws of Raheerah around his throat—and above, the children were still talking to him, of birds, of a stone, of Nemean.

The water around him crystallized and froze as the chill emanated from his body, his powerful large wings raising and then pushing downward, propelling him toward the distant surface. He did not think to give a warning as the surface of the lagoon swelled and burst, a sudden shower and flood of cold water washing the room and any in it clean off their feet; as the water rolled off of the walls and receded back into the lagoon, a light rain-like drizzle fell from the water that had washed the high ceiling.

Tenzin was suspended momentarily with his wings extended, pieces of the waterfall freezing as it fell onto his body, before his massive wings began to beat cold air into the room as he guided himself to the edge of the lagoon.

One of the last few remaining titans, he was enormous in size, towering over them as he carefully watched for their bodies in the receding water. His light-blue and silver feathers had grown back but his darker blue outer ones had not; the fog of cold air had returned, puffing off of their edges as it used to. It felt great to be topside again, but still, there were remnants of the fire, especially along his back; and claw-like scars were carved into his neck.

"What of this tri-colored stone?" he asked them, his voice light. "If the Kings of Orion are seeking it, it is likely not entirely a trap," Tenzin commented, thinking. "But a bringer of life? Hmm." What did that mean?

"The betrayer indeed is Nemean," he agreed. What did Nemean have to do with the Kings? Has she influenced the change in their leadership? That would not be good.

"You say the Kings have fused? Then they have again changed who leads the way. Do you know which King has the most control?" he asked, looking down to them.

Dragon was washed well back, his bellow of surprise being swallowed up by a choking gurgle. When at last the water stilled and the receding tide subsided, he was left scrambling in place on the rock.

It was cold. With a few huffs, he looked up, crawling back over beneath the grand ice phoenix to listen to his words. He glanced back to ensure Kera was still alive, before turning his full attention to Tenzin.

"I do not know why they wish it!" he tried to bellow, except he still had water in his throat, and it more gurgled out. "I would answer your questions, bird, yet none have told the children a thing, since we began. We know not who leads, why we are here, nor how, even, we came to be. We know only what we see through holes in the stone, what we can see of the lights beyond, and what stories we can guess at from there!" Dragon, for all his selfish aggression, sounded surprisingly melancholy about this, but a moment later he was addressing the task at hand once more.

"As for which took control--the blue one, I believe! The three created a challenge. A test of--popularity, perhaps. They promise wings to those who serve. I do not know if it is a trick!"

He turned, calling up his magic once more, attempting to spread the wings that Alnitak had gifted him, to show the phoenix exactly what was going on.

The red ethereal bat-wings spread upward, smoky with black, and he looked back to Tenzin. He was not hoping that the phoenix could help them, at that moment--he was hoping the situation was clear enough. Tenzin, he believed, knew far more than they; with luck, he'd be able to discern if this was a trick or a trap, one that might endanger their survival--or if it were something that might aid their chances.

@Kera