frying, burning, cuts-a stinging, bringing you the pain (part XLVII)

(Continued from part XLVI.)

"Anywho..." Lina finally continued. "Look, monster, you need to go, and this place is my responsibility to protect, so--off you go!"

Emilly tilted her head. She heard something--odd. A...hissing? Not exactly. A...very...organic...hum...a hum, she slowly realized, she knew. She swallowed, turning to Justine, putting a hand on her arm. "She opened a rift!" she hissed.

"What?"

"A rift! On Gearhaven!"

Back at Gearhaven, another thin, thin thread of sound in Lina's head.

{{Niis de a umadea...Ol zir g a clock umadea...}}

Lina gritted her teeth and pushed the second monster through, along with bits of the one she'd slided to collops with the net gun.

"I really hope no one's in that limbo, or I may get a rude letter, or whatever..."

Justine's eyes went wide. Rift? she mouthed. Emilly slowly nodded.

"All right, pushed the other monsters in. Armor mode off--eep!"

"Eep what?" Emilly said, panicked. "What eep?"

"Armor mode not off, repeat not off!"

"Why--"

A new voice heard over the comm. Male. Tentative. "I...think I may have drawn them off, or...I've been trying to..."

Emilly rubbed her forehead. The lighthouse keeper. Of course.

"Drawn them off...how??" she asked.

"Just by being outside, in range," Lokizen said. "I'm in the garden, trying to lead them away."

"Oh, no, they weren't in the garden yet..."

"Seems they don't want to follow me."

"'Course not," Lina said. "'Cause they want me to take my armor off."

Emilly blinked. "Gender-based?" She thought ferociously for a minute, before shaking her head. "Wait, that doesn't make sense, they chased Rusty into the music room..."

"I'm outside now," Lina said.

"Good--"

"Okay, how did they come back from limbo?" Lina asked. "They have to be dimensional-based..."

Unbeknownst to those in Stormhold, Lina kicked in her suit's thrusters, rising into the air. "What in the nine is happening in the sea?" they heard her ask.

"Everything," Emilly said dourly.

"Holy cats." Lina looked around. "Did an airship go down?"

"The Gray Area crashed...somehow."

"Yep...I think I know where the unwanted guests came from."

"Oh?" Emilly asked.

"Well, they are coming from it...I think the crash caused a rip in the fabric of space and time."

"I think you're exactly right, Lina." Justine nodded. Emilly continued to look concerned.

"Aww, crap, not again...I need to fly."

"We'll be home soon--" Emilly started.

"We will fight again later," Justine said.

"No, I fly to keep 'em off me--I mean, I'm in the air to try to keep one off me."

"Good luck, Lina!" Lokizen cried through the comm, and there was the subtle tic of that communication link closing.

"Umm, you too--say, how did the Gray Area crash?"

"That's what we're trying to find out!" Emilly said.

Lina sighed. "I am so fired...well, might as well take a look..." Another pause, and then "There's something green coming out the top of the ship in the water."

Emilly nodded. "It's fairly toxic." She made her apologies to the group, told Justine she was returning, and folded a bit of local space to rearrange her on Darktow. She swam across the small channel to the shore temple, turned around, and cried out in startlement.

"There are more of those things next to the island!" she said.

"They're all over the Gray Area, too," Lina said. "Umm...maybe I seen too many docs, but...what if they're here to save the green thing?"

Emilly blinked. "Green thing?" She peered around the back of the shore temple, and watched a new clump of tentacle beasts try to snatch Lina out of the sky. The previous ones had been black, these were...red, yellow, and...yes, green. What now?

"Am okay," Lina said breathlessly.

"Good..."

"I tried ta get close, but they really don't want me near the ship."

She agreed. "They really don't."

"So...that means they're protecting it."

"But why?"

"So, we either kill it, or put it somewhere else. That's what I'm tryin' to figger out--I mean, they look nothing alike..." Loud sound of disgust over the comm. "Goddess. I'm so dense..."

"What?"

"It's the mom...I'm willing to bet, or--the other sex of the species--"

Thin voice. No closer. No stronger. But present. {{Why do you think only one thing can access the rift?}}

(Continued in part XLVIII.)