Welcome to Gaia! ::

The shadows in Arheins seemed to cease their seemingly perpetual movements, having noticed an intruder in their midst. All of the ruined town, like a carcass writhing with black maggots in every crevice, seemed to still with their hesitation.

The shadows, in their stillness, seemed to take form. Little creatures lifted their heads to watch the intruder soaring above them. Scales glinted in the light that was provided.

Squeaking. Chirping. Baying. All at once a rush of sound erupted from the lifeless town below. The denizens were in a frenzy, frantic to meet the outsider, to finally communicate with another of their kind.

A wyvern.

All the wyverns watched their guests further. The strangers were behaving oddly. These gestures and the body language were new to them, for they had only seen one another for quite a while, and the only beorc -- no, he wasn't a beorc -- the only person's body language they'd seen was the one who'd raised them. Some of the younger wyverns had never seen him though.

Eventually the wyverns got the message. Like a wave, the impulse washed through them, beginning from those gathered around the guests to the wyverns at the edges of the crowd. They all turned their heads in one direction, as though controlled by one mind, one thought. All of Arheins seemed connected into one organism.

And then one little wyrmling broke that feeling of conformity. He popped his head above the crowd, looking in the same direction as the others, and squeaked:

"Uh-oh."

The black wyvern, far away back in the cathedral, turned his head to a white-scaled brother nearby. His jaws parted ever so slightly and his stiff lips began to curve.

"Storm," said the black wyvern.

The white wyvern grunted, silvery eyes awash with concern, and it slinked off to spread the alarm. Seconds later a shriek permeated the silence, a drawn-out cry that signified to them all that trouble was near.

What they did not know was that it was the wrath of a god.

It seemed, at first, that the wyverns didn't need any assistance.

They knew the procedure for waiting out a storm. The crowd quickly dispersed, the synergy shattering as each wyvern went its own way, stumbling over the toes of its brethen or tripping on another's tail, or perhaps making a clean beeline for the nearest shelter. Masses of black and white and red and green and all colors of wyverns wriggled down beneath the skin of Arheins, where they disappeared, as though they'd never existed.

At the cathedral the black one remained on the alert. He gazed out, believing all was clear. When the first rain hit he planned to withdraw.

But something was wrong.

He began to see something in the distance. The eyes of a wyvern were not normally phenomenal, so at first it was an indistinct form just on the horizon. He was puzzled by it. But the form began to clear as it drew nearer and larger. He remained puzzled by it, but suddenly he was bewildered. He was afraid of this thing rising on the horizon.

Below, the 'uh-oh wyrmling poked its head out.

"Uh-oh."

It was a tsunami. And none of them knew what a tsunami was.

The black wyvern in the cathedral lost his breath. He didn't know the word for this phenomenon. It wasn't a storm, no. He didn't know what it was. It just looked like a wall. A wall of --

"U...uu...uwa...uwatah...water..."

The creatures peeked out again to view the tidal wave headed for their humble abode, a thing massive enough for most to see. They sat helplessly in their spots, not knowing the procedure for tidal waves.

It was mostly the tinier and very young wyverns that could fit on Haar's without weighing him down too much, but the population was still too many and too large. The wyverns, in a panic, began darting in the absolute opposite direction of the tidal wave, though they all gravitated toward the cathedral. It was centered in Arheins, after all, and they had to pass it up eventually. It appeared to be their base of operations and thus their instinctive refuge.

The small wyverns that fit on Haar's wyvern were awed. They had never known how to fly, and so the wyrmlings gazed down at the landscape beneath them, feeling the impression of the height they were at, feeling the difference in air pressure and feeling somehow dwarfed by the surrounding landscape -- yet bigger than it too. The wyrmlings rose in another clamor of chirping and squawking and baying. They wanted to learn what this was. They wanted to learn how to fly.

The slightly more experienced wyverns had picked up on it, but there were still very few who understood flying. The young adults which did promptly scooped up their younger sisters and brothers and, following their guest's example, took off into the air.

Still, there were many flightless wyverns scurrying across the ground in a race to outdo the oncoming tidal wave. There were not enough fliers with sufficient strength to scoop them all up, and so there remained a great portion desperately kicking across the rubble and debris of Arheins, flooding into the cathedral. Some had fallen behind via tripping or stumbling. Surprisingly, none had been trampled.

The black one overlooking the situation was watching the wall of water that was surging forward. Arheins was not very far from the coast (in fact, some broken streets still led there) and the tsunami was enormous. His white-scaled brother returned with an inquisitive growl. Twitching his head up in a sort of nod, the black wyvern turned away from the window and scrambled out of the room.

The flightless wyverns had gathered in the sanctuary of the cathedral where the altar and incense burner were. The black and white brothers soon entered as well, and with scarcely a flick of his tail the black one swooped down upon the altar, collected the incense burner in his claws, and cracked his jaws apart in a powerful yet medium-toned roar to the others. They all responded likewise, in bays and cries and bellows. He stretched his wings and skimmed their hopeful heads as he sailed out of the sanctuary. His older white-scaled brother followed, and soon did the crowd.

The black wyvern soared out and up to Haar's wyvern. His eyes connected with the other's, then with Haar's, before he sharply turned and soared away with the incense burner in his claws. He, his brother, and the other fliers sailed a path toward a forest away from the coastline.

It was then that the water broke upon the shores. The wall of sea crashed down and began to surge toward the ruined town of Arheins, smothering all in a murky torrent. Each individual, whether winding through the maze of rubble or carving a path in the skies, had their eyes set for the forest. Whether or not it was the right refuge was something none of them would dare wonder (if they had the capability in the first place).

The surge flooded further and further inward, shoving rubble around in a wash of destruction, toppling weakened foundations within Arheins as it made its advance. But despite the massive buildup, no amount of clutter could slow the murky torrent in its wrathful charge. More and more of the town's dreary carcass drowned beneath the waters.

And it wasn't the only thing.

One wyrmling that had dropped a time too many had found the wave right on its tail. In a panic it darted up a jut of debris. It twined around the protrusion, believing the debris to be stable, when it was really loose; thus when the surge went through, the jut succumbed and the wyrmling was thrown into the water.

The wyrmling thrashed in the water, smacking its wings against the surface as it fought for air, for control, for safety. It shrieked a pleading wail for its brothers to come and snatch it away from danger, but none of the charging wyverns ahead could it hear among their own noise. Its own wings were dragging it under. Its panicked flailing was more harm than help. The wyrmling slowly sank, desperate and frightened.

One of the young wyverns on Haar's dragon noticed a small figure below. It was white, a bright contrast to the debris and waters around it. The wyvern recognized the white glimmer as a drowning brother and, filled by the sensation of flight, recklessly believed that it too could soar. The wyvern jumped off of Haar's dragon and plummeted. It spread its wings, its claws open to grab the drowning wyrmling.

The 'uh-oh' wyrmling looked down from Haar's dragon and said its motto.

Soon both the white wyrmling and the foolish wyvern were drowning.

Ahead, the crowd pushed on, following the fliers away from certain death. The surge was still strong and was catching up to them with each breath, each step, each stride.