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The muscles in his arms were beginning to tire just a bit. Sand was hard to move through. His inexperience with it made it even more difficult. Driving Gothsmog's pole into the sand, he clung to her for dear life.

If he could just hold on, just a little longer maybe something would happen. Something that would save them all.

Zascha's Distance: 19
HP: 35/40
(5/5)

Somehow he had managed to snag Gothsmog on something hidden beneath the sand. Whether it were merely a rock or another Hunter corpse he didn't care. For the moment he wasn't moving and he was fine with that.

It was Nora's voice that broke through the sound of Hunter screams and whirling sand. And a smile broke upon his face. Green eyes searching until he spotted her clinging to a pole a bit further ahead of him.

Great big lummox? "Just remember...you owe me some pie so don't you go getting eaten either. I don't plan on dieing anytime soon and after all this is said and done I plan to collect on that pie debt." His grip on Gothsmog's pole tightened as he pulled his scarf up around his mouth and nose. No point in trying to survive the monster mouth thing if you suffocate from sand in your lungs.

Zascha's Distance: 19
HP: 35/40

"Y-yeah...You're right." She did have a point, and seeing the others that had been rescued, it was something that Jason could hold onto. A small bit of hope that everything hadn't been lost.

"It's good to meet you both." He replied to both Jasper and Nora, "Always nice to k-know I'm not alone in a-all of this." He also wondered what kind of pie cobbler would be involved, and then decided if he survived all of this he should try making some himself. But his thoughts were dragged back to reality by the cursing of Jasper, and he felt his gut clench at the other hunter's attempt to clear his eyes.

"I-it's alright..." He spoke softly, his gaze adverting to the shifting sands underneath him. "Just glad I c-could help." To his next question, he first shifted his body weight, keeping a tight hand on his weapon so he wouldn't slide down any further. "F-for now, we'll just w-wait until further orders I guess." He then paused, biting his bottom lip before adding on. "P-perhaps the division leads could figure out some way to help us...o-or even the people trapped in there...If this creature is anything like the one in the movie."

The redheaded Death Hunter was vaguely aware of the introductions being thrown around, but mostly confused. "YEAH, there's a lot of land," she said, her voice muffled (and her mind apparently not computing that Land was his name, not some joke about the sand swallowing them all). "Glad to be moved up higher." And, she hoped, that it would stay that way.

If it weren't so terrifying, this entire situation might have made Hanna laugh. Some were flying into hero mode, immediately struggling to save others. Some were crying out for help, either receiving it or causing others to fall to their Sarlacc-y deaths because of it. And some, to her complete shock, voluntarily threw themselves into the maw. In her heart of hearts, Hanna knew that she would never be that person. She highly doubted her capability to love someone else's life more than her own.

Ever since she landed here, Hanna had struggled to save herself, and though she was incredibly thankful for the fellow hunter who had pulled her up to a much better perch, the girl wondered if she would have been capable of such bravery. She was a survivor. A selfish, selfish survivor. Hanna didn't believe death was the next great adventure. She thought it was darkness, forever.

Beside her, Nora was scrambling again. Should she try again? So far, her efforts had served mostly to send her flying backward and injuring her thigh (twice). Before she could decide, her very savior from before (Land) flew suddenly away from her. "Maybe we should wait for the sandstorm to pass!" she called out to everyone in her vicinity. After a moment, she added, "I'M HANNA!" Because people who gave introductions and just met couldn't die moments later, right? RIGHT?

Blood seeped from the gash at her thigh, soaking into her fitted black pants. "Please, no infection..." she whispered to herself, as if saying it aloud could make it so. She didn't want to survive this only to potentially die to Bizarre Desert Bacteria.

Hanna is at 10 meters and holding on!
HP: 30/40








((I think I quoted everyone near her -- sorry if I missed you!))

nora distance: 6

"Nowhere," she replied to Inoke airily. "Just a few meters up. Wanted to see if I could get a better look at our surroundings." She would have gone on, but he slipped further down, and she hissed a curse. Maybe she ought to have stayed back and kept him nailed to the damn pole then. At least he wasn't too far gone; that was what she focused on.

She scoffed down at Zascha next. "I'm not the one halfway there," she retorted more gruffly than usual. "Get your arse up here and maybe I will be so gratious." She was still rewatching the image of her cousin just . . . falling into the maw playing in her head. That wasn't the worst part of it: that prize went to the fact that he did so because his so-called girlfriend barely fought against the creature, and some impulsive need to be a hero had come over him. But Nora would have to assume they weren't--that none of the ones swallowed--were dead. Not unless they ran across more corpses at any rate. It was the blunt, usual way her mind worked in order to cope.

"No heading yet," she told Jasper with a slight shake of her head, trying to dispel the vision. "Just hang tight until this thing gets its fill or, hell, we get a deus ex machina, related or unrelated to our employers." He seemed to be nearing the panic Jason had been edging towards, and Nora fixed him with a look. "Not the time to be thinking like that. Head in the game, Jasper; swallowed doesn't mean dead."

No matter how many teeth popped up or corpses bobbed about them.

Jason recieved a similar look as he started to stammer; at least it was just that, though, and not, say, absolute flailing. It was a little unsettling that Deus didn't do better screening for spines in its trainees, however, especially given the example the girl--Cami--had displayed with the beheaded body earlier. "Funny way of showing if they did want to help now, seeing as no leader or assistant bothered showing up to the morning wake up call," Nora pointed out dryly. "I'm almost ready to peg this as an elaborate, if deadly, prank."

Land--Arland, apparently--soon joined his friend down below, though Nora bit back her second curse in lieu of keeping her cool. A tug of war, that's all this was. Considering how hardy the group had been thus far against the current, she wasn't going to start doubting them now. Just had to keep talking, as chatter seemed to make this easier to handle in spite of the sand spewing everywhere.

"Where's some damn rope when you need it . . ." Nora puffed out a breath, hooking her arm around the protrusion in the sand so that she could better wrap her scarf around her mouth. Wearing armor suddenly didn't feel like such a hot idea, the sweat starting to come down in her brow and cheeks until sand crusted on top. It wasn't hard to see that Hanna was favouring a leg or, rather, that it was leaving a little trail of blood behind.

"Pressure," she urged her. "Put some pressure on that if you can." From what Evan and her own personal experience had told her, the rest got taken care of by the weapon.

[ AT THE LIGHTHOUSE (or close to it) ]

Before anyone knew what hit them, those resting at the lighthouse would feel their vision go black. The next thing they knew they were sliding down the pit of a very dangerous sand monster wandering what exactly went wrong.

[ AT THE PIT ]

The sand stopped churning. It was still again. For those who had not been swallowed they were saved.

There was sand everywhere, it felt like they had inhaled sand until it cloistered their skin, eyes, lips, nose, and even breathing felt like a struggle. It was easier to just lie there, battered, bruised. It was easier to try and forget, as the wind slowed down, that none of this had happened. That somehow, they could just go home.

"What the-" Mark had finally arrived as well, holding a more pocket-sized tablet in one hand. "I thought you said the titan was taken care of." He turned around to face someone who wasn't there. A slow, long moment. "Oh my g-"

- Once again proving the sum value of the Death assistant, a giant appendage made entirely of grey rose out from the fog and pulled Mark below the sand.

A few seconds later, there was a terrible shriek, a series of them, the sand shook violently-

- And several hundred arm-like appendages, a pale semi-transparent grey, burst from the sand, grabbing at anything nearby, bodies, items, still live Hunters, and pulled them into the sand beneath.

Her massive weapon was making staying put a lot easier time than some others seemed to be having. That didn't make it stable. Waving back and forth, Hanna exerted all of her energy into not falling into the abyss. Over her shoulder, she heard a voice chasing the wind in her direction, but took a second to register that the person saying Red was talking to her. There were certainly worse nicknames to have. Like Land, though Arland sounded regal to her, like the protagonist in a historical romance. Deus was a weird-name-haven.

Nora's voice reached her next, but the advice was something that Hanna already knew, even though her social graces told her the other girl was being supportive. Unfortunately, Hanna was sort of an a*****e so she snapped, "I know that. It's a matter of having extra hands that would be nice right about now."

But none of that mattered because <********> -- that guy Mark was there, but also GREY ARMS and -- before Hanna knew it, she was being yanked backward into what she assumed was a quick and painful end. In her frantic scrambling, she successfully managed to (1) keep a hold of her weapon and (2) yank on Zascha's coat as she went flying by.

The movement pushed her scarf off of her nose and mouth, providing her a gritty mouthful of sand as she was yanked through the air like a ragdoll. The last thing she saw clearly before her surroundings grew dark was the glowing sky above her, a swiftly extinguished candle.

Hanna has been sucked into the pit!
HP: 30/40