Welcome to Gaia! ::

"I see it... what- a sandwich?" Nyx said in disbelief. What was a sandwich doing there? Why weren't the lights working? Who put a mine here? Was there anyone here? What was that dead thing? She returned Darwin to his pokeball, not wanting to risk anything happening to the expensive pokemon while they were exploring the questionably safe mine.

"well... either someone was careless, or had a reason to drop this so suddenly." She added, glancing over at the others before continuing to the lunch cool, using her foot to kick it over.

Umbreon made a wide circle around the sandwich to follow his master.

The whole situation was growing more and more ominous and creepy the further they went - not that it was any competition for Tethys, of course - and Claire frowned thoughtfully. It was obvious the miners left in a hurry, but from what? Hopefully they'd get out without finding the source of the sudden abandonment of the mine.

Zeus, on the other hand, seemed impervious to how scary the mine seemed, and he trotted over to sniff the tool box before bounding off further down the path. If there was stuff laying around from humans, surely there must be chocolate somewhere.

Aila drew what might have been the deepest, most level and calming breath of her life. No other breath she breathed from that moment on would permeate her with such a deeply satisfying sensation of centering unto herself and her environment. She was calm. She was every calm ever. She was all the calm.

"Revenant." The ghost-type, on hearing her name, listened with a momentary increase in attentiveness. "When I give the cue, do something violent to whomever is immediately behind me." A warning that, hopefully, would be heeded. She wasn't in the mood for unnecessary antics.

More hopefully, they would be out of the cave soon. So hopefully.

In and out of shadow. Here the rock face darkened, a tunnel gaped to the side. A steady 'pock pock pock' echoed from the darkness.

The air flowed in Aila's wake, unimpeded by any presence. There was a steady glow up ahead.

Orion, walked along a few paces behind Aila, humming boredly until he heard the strange pock sounds, and glanced towards the glow... squinting slightly.

"Huh, ya know... they say there's strange things that happen underground. Spritis or something, that like to grab people, and they're never seen again. And then those people join them, and haunt places like this."

The contact was not repeated, and so the cue was not given. Instead there was a question, posed by a familiar voice. "Nothing of consequence," she replied. "Some insolent whelp who doesn't value his own hands, if I had to guess." Ooh, there went all that calm she had worked so hard to gather. Another deep breath. She remembered hearing Aulus claim he would bring up the rear, which indicated he was among few behind her. Retrospectively, his phrasing was suspicious as well. She didn't see the green-haired man ahead of her either, which indicated he was also somewhere there. Now there was a much more likely candidate.

Well, not that it mattered. She'd spent enough time in the company of a certain Drifblim that she was capable of brushing off such minute harassment. More important was the task of removing herself and her teammates from the cave. Orion's remark, however, begged a rebuttal, "I'd say it's more likely that people become spirits when they grab the wrong person." The quip was delivered in a sharp tongue, and she didn't deign to as much as turn to regard the individual she was addressing. She was really sick of that cave. Even the menacing rhythm of some unidentified sound couldn't frustrate her any more than she already was.

Faleen looked over when Aulus said that.
Being toward the front, she didn't see what had happened, but when listening she gathered that someone had been grabbed.
"Banette" She spoke, sharply.
She did indeed have an invisible ghost.
a few moments after the pokemon was called the Banette reappeared "Did you go near Aila?"

The Banette blinked, and shook his head.