Welcome to Gaia! ::

When the brochure for the academy had been given to young Sunburst, he had seen the bylines 'meet new people' 'go to interesting new places' 'save others from villainy.' Oh, he knew that it wasn't all smiles and shaking hands with the mayor or saving small robotic kittens from angry talking trees. Sometimes hero-work was down and dirty. Sometimes hero work was gritty and boring. Sometimes hero work involved a pair of thigh-high plastic boots that smelled like mouldy socks left in the rain and a strong stomach.

And sometimes it involved trudging through a sewer, the only light coming from the glow of boy who channelled sunlight while you tried to remember what anything but the walls and floor smelled like and prayed there was no one flushing a whole block of the city any time soon.

Sometimes hero work sucked.

Sunburst, the aforementioned glowing boy was having trouble staying positive. It was hard to stay upbeat when something questionably warm was floating past and the narrow little walkway they were slowly climbing along was full of detritus of undesirable nature. It was worse when they were walking into a dark, forbidding underworld maze with only the light of his... erm... heart, and a crappy ancient old map that looked like it was written in some ancient Egyptian dialect that all architects spoke but no one else did. He had felt so excited when he'd been requested by the teacher, Black Blood was the detention guy, so Straffe had naturally never had much contact with him, but still, he was just a little proud when he'd gotten called to the office to assist on a hero's mission! There was even a sidekick going to be along with them, (probably to actually be the real assisting party for the teacher)-- Straffe had foolishly assumed it was a reward for his good class participation and that he had done some exemplary work, but.. no.... no... how foolish.

Some sewers had a sort of dampening effect on electrical devices, some areas were too far underground for phone signals or wireless to reach... and there was the ghosts that turned lights off, the skittering things that lived down here in the dark... waiting... watching.

Straffe was here because the hero needed something to see in the dark with, conveniently there was a boy who glowed in the dark. It would score Straffe extra marks for class participation, surely.

To say that Sunburst was nervous was an understatement. He was glowing with nervous energy, literally and metaphorically too. It wasn't so bad for the mysterious Shroud, or the strong Black Blood; they didn't have a large target practically painted on their backs. What could everything that might or might not be down here see? Sunburst. and it didn't matter if he was standing in the middle, at the back or at the front, they were in a dark, dark place and the only light was the black man. This, as they said in horror movies, would not end well.

Of course, no one believed there were ghosts down here, did they? No. No ghosts. Of course not. If ghosts were real there would be cow and dinosaur ghosts. No one was ever haunted by a cow-ghost.

But giant cubes of gelatinous perviness? Well, they were probably, hopefully, down here.

"So I hear this thing ate a white-goods store." Sunburst spoke, trying to distract himself from the sensation that something, somewhere, was slithering closer. He whispered, even though stealth, for him, was a moot point. He also wanted to bond, yes, bond, and show the hero and sidekick how totally not s**t-scared the rookie was. After all, manly men don't show fear and there was a job to be done. Sunburst was all about... well... achieving goals.

The mission Black Blood received was a bit complex. Crantel’s sewer was enormous and puzzle-like and it would take them a while to find the monster. Maybe somehow they could draw it closer to them. Well cats and dogs are attracted to laser pointers. Maybe the same concept could work with the gelatinous monster. Then he proceeded and plucked Sunburst from the list.

Later on, ‘Shroud’ was added to their party, a recently promoted sidekick’s first mission. He itched to flunk her in the remarks after the mission for no reason at all. Just to troll a first timer probably, or a pay back to his sidekick years. It was a nice thought, but he knew he had to take this seriously.

‘Why does it have to be this place’ his nose squished between his index finger and thumb.

“It stinks” he made a funny audible sound when he spoke with his fingers still clutched his nose like that, so he let it go and said,

“Hey sidekick! Don’t scare the kid” her presence seems vaguely familiar but he shrugged it off, she’s a student he probably met somewhere at the academy.

Black Blood turned to the boy and encourage him, “For one thing, I admire your courage, you have a tough role in this mission you know. And you can always just run away, turn the job down pretend you’re sick…but you didn’t chicken out,”

well sort of.

“It’s not easy being a live-bait” he coughed after he said that, it wasn’t easy to breathe inside the place small full of god-knows-what.

“Beside if you leave us out…” he cracked his knuckles with one hand, while the other trails through the walls as he went closer to the rookie. “I’ll never--” he poked Sunburst’s chest with every sentence he says “Let. You. Get away with it.” He never meant to be mean to the boy, he just despises cowardice when he smells it, “Understood?” he said it while he raised a brow.

“Hey Shroud… Shroud was it? Congrats on getting promoted, now let’s stop this small talk and let’s get going,” he patted the mysterious Shroud’s shoulder and walked in front of them.

“I have a place to go to after this” the usual, underground fights at night for money. He wanted to enter a tournament again. And probably look for another place to stay. He can’t live at the academy all the time. Especially if he wanted to start looking for clues that he doesn’t want the academy to find out, or get them involve with.

“And Sunburst, don’t worry, Shroud and I will protect you,” he added that mostly because of his unneeded remark earlier. "Can you adjust your light to be brighter?"

If ghosts popped up in mind of the younger man in their group, BB can’t help to remember tales about the giant crocodile in the sewers. Once a baby crocodile was flushed into the toilet and it lived down here at the sewers, consuming chemicals, human wastes and dead bodies of previously living creatures that it became ginormous. Well it was a myth and nobody has seen it yet. But it would be horrifying to be eaten alive by a giant crocodile.

Someone, or something moved pass them or was it beyond them….he thought, or felt it, then he thought…

“That’s not a crocodile right?” …out loud.

She had half a mind to give a snarky response to Blood, but thought better of it considering the situation. If they made too much noise, that blob might notice them...As she was thinking this, and how such a large mass could just disappear like that, she was taken by surprise from his pat. She jerked a bit, being brought back to the 'now'. 'Always so touchy,' Shroud sighed to herself, remembering the one time the a** through her over his shoulder. Ahh, whatever...It'd been, what, 2 years since then? 'It's actually been a while since I've seen Blood at all, now that I think about it. 2 or 3 months, at least...'

She cringed a tad, when Sunburst glowed just a bit brighter and she ended up taking a few steps ahead to avoid his light. With her eyes blacked out as they were now, she found she couldn't see as well in the dark as she should have due to Straffe's glow. If anything, her eyesight was just barely above average right now..."Huh? Crocodile? Goldfish piranha...?" she repeated with a frown, "Geez, and you were worried about me making a little joke...You're both psyching yourself out over some stupid urban legends. Man up!" Shroud shook her head reprimandedy at this, turning back ahead.

'Where is that blob? We've been walking for a while already, but no sign of it anywhere...A huge, gelatinous thing like that can't be hard to miss! Ugh, all I can see so far is trash and muck and sewer water...'

"Clowrey, I think I heard something--From the right tunnel at the split just in front of us. Be careful..."

She came to a halt at said split, looking towards the right tunnel Corduroy had pointed out. "Hey, lets try this way," she nonchalantly suggested to the other two, hopping over to the other side. The tunnel was long and wide, and with no end in sight it must have been deep too. She strained her ears to try and hear anything...But heard nothing.
. . .Not even running sewer waters. 'That can't be right...'

Of course Shroud seemed totally un-phased by the slimy walls or the floating refuse, she must have had a stomach of pure iron and the professionalism of... well... a true professional? He straightened his shoulders as she gave them her motivational speech; however short it was.

Sunburst adjusted his mask and took a few steps to where Shroud was pointing, he almost slipped on something but after a brief wobble kept going. He should have noticed something off about that, they had been plodding along pretty safely with decent ground beneath them, no one had taken a spill yet at all; he should have looked down and checked what he was slipping on; it felt greasy, oily... oozey. But no, Straffe kept walking after he righted his balance; eyes straining ahead of his glow that he might see... well... was it like a green or purple or orange slime?

Come to think of it, he hadn't asked many questions about what they were hunting, was it sentient? It seemed to have at least an animal intelligence if it was eating and running, but maybe it could be negotiated with? Perhaps it was quite smart and capable of communication? Or was he over-thinking this? Did one negotiate with a criminal? Compromise was the doorway to folly.

"What colour did you say this thing was, anyway?" He turned, looking behind him toward the hero and sidekick. Another mistake. A rookie mistake. Behind him, visible to the other two, something dripped off the ceiling like a pudding in a bowl. Only a moving, very large, angry pudding. Straffe's backlight gave the dark ooze a sinister expression, almost nightmarish indents on its surface as though the ooze leered at the foolish hero and his portable light and the sidekick with her snuffly throat. It loomed over the oblivious rookie, rising up like it was about to crash down and smother something.

Good thing Shroud acted fast, and pulled Sunburst in time. The ‘bait’ plan worked alright, but what comes after that? ‘This is ridiculous, what a mess.’ he thought as he ran towards the place Shroud pointed them to go. “Wait! Not there!” It’s too late and it was his fault when he chose children for this kind of job. That place looked like a hard place to escape through, if things got worse. It was a big mistake to hastily do a job. But he did indeed need to finish this mission as quick as possible. And as a result their lives were in danger. These kids lives! ‘Tsk! Bad move.’ he muttered under his breath, scowled at his frustration.

As they stopped to catch up their breath, Black Blood went closer to his team, “Shroud, looks like you can see through the dark, can you see anything around we can use to distract it?” it was enough to use the glowing boy as a lure o their unprepared trap. Then he took out his acid blood contained in five a small glass vials and gave it to the rookie. “Hey, these can disintegrate anything, including you, so use it wisely. In case of emergency.”

Then just like in some monster flick movie, noises of hot air vent pipes bursting one by one can be heard. As if the jello monster purposely destroyed them to obscure their vision more, creating a thick damp vapor around the trio and hoped they would get separated with each other before they reach the second tunnel.

“Stay close you two, ...hey... guys?”

Distract it? WITH WHAT?
There was dirt and muck and other refuse, but those would hardly do any good. "There's nothing in this tunnel we can use--We just have to find a way out for now," she called back to BB, trying to head quicker down to the branching tunnel. But then the fog came in...She swore, she only let go of Burst's hand for a second. Only a second...

But a second was all that monster needed.

A slew of Tasean curses escaped from Shroud's covered mouth then. "Blood! It got Burst!" she shouted, grabbing on to his wrist to alert him to where she was. With the fog obsucring everyone else's vision, there was no way she'd let another person get taken away like that. 'Dammit! There has to be something...wait.'
"It...It uhh looks like it can't eat people as quickly as other stuff," she noted out loud. they might buy them some time to figure out...something. Damn damn damn...! What were they suppose to do against it?!

Her smoke probably wouldn't do any damage, even if she made an object solid. It's friggin' jello. Could acid burn acid? A nightlight wouldn't help...And then, for some strange reason, she remembered her brother and his weird fondness for horror movies. Didn't he have a movie that was sorta like this...? Ugh, how did it end again?!
"Do either of you happen to know the movie, 'The Gelatinous Terror'?" she asked with blind aim.