NPF Avatars IV, Chapter IX: Overt Lovecraft Reference!

[Arhra]

As the sub was summoned, Arhra suddenly remembered something. "Oh, wait." she said, patting her pockets. "I just remembered, I packed myself a rebreather."

Arhra finally located the piece of equipment. "Screw you hippies!" she finished triumphantly, waving disdainfully at the people loading themselves into the frog sub. Come on, a frog? Oh, giant frogs are natural so that won't hurt the environment, man. It probably ran on solar power or dung. Damn hippies.

She put on the mask, checking it was securely fastened and clambered up the stairs at the empty pool's edge. Arhra paused for a moment, remembering sometihng else important, "Hydra, stay with them." she said, voice slightly muffled. As Hydra insinuated her tall, but thankfully lean frame through the frog's entry hatch, Arhra climbed into the water and started frog-kicking her way along.

The other non-water breathing NPFers, no doubt stung by being called hippies, swiftly got themselves ready, also undoubtedly set on showing Arhra up. But, the frog starting up will not be shown right now. Nor will any interesting piloting Phil may or may not have done.

But, it wasn't very far along the flooded hall at all when it opened up in a great, cylindrical chamber. The rotted remains of a wide spiral stair-case marked its sides, now mostly hidden by great curtains of seaweed. The waters seethed with a mind boggling number of different animals, whirling in frenzied paths after one another. The only way forwards was through them, to the opening at the top of the chamber. They did not appreciate intruders.

OOC: Check the discussion thread for info on the Swarm of Deadly Sea Animals (http://forum.nuklearpower.com/showpost.php?p=469088&postcount=22). Seeing how most people are fairly well protected inside tin cans, let's just make it one post or so of going through the swarms.

[Bailey]

"Tutorial mode? Okay, sure. Sounds good."

[The secondary weapons system has two main methods of attack.]

[Let's start with laser cannons.]

"Laser cannons are secondary?"

[By moving the joystick,]

[By moving the joystick,]

"What? OH! I have to move it."

[You can move your targetting reticle.]

[Why don't you aim it at that convenient swarm of monsters?]

[Now hit the (A) Button.]

[This attack is very powerful, but it can't be used again for a little while.]

[You have to wait for the charge bar.]

A small gauge flashed.

[To fill up again.]

[Now let's look at the missiles.]

[Move your targetting reticle to pick out a specific monster. How about that laser shark?]

[Keep it in your sights and hit the (B) button.]

[Oh, you missed and hit that kill turtle instead.]

[You have to keep the targetting reticle on your target even after you fire.]

[Once the missile hits, you can move the reticle to something else.]

[Try that again. Move the targetting reticle onto the laser shark.]

[Now hit the (B) button and keep the targetting reticle locked.]

[Very good!]

[You have now mastered the basics of the secondary weapons system.]

[Please contact the operator in the primary weapons system and turn on the combos tutorial for more information.]

Syttulg looked around and put on a headphones type of thing he saw.

"This is the secondary weapons system calling the primary. You ready to start the combos tutorial or are you still doing the basic?"

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

Just when he needed his speed the most, a wall of monstrous marine life blocked Hawks path. Unfortunately, due to the increased friction from being surounded by water, he was unable to move at full speed. Not only that, if he DIDN'T move fast he would likely run out of air before long. And worse still, most of his concentration was bent upon keeping the air around him from collapsing and with only that air to call upon he was also unable to attack! He now sincerly wished he had taken the sub through here.

But then, at the top of his vision, Hawk caught a glimpse of what appeared to be an air pocket. He ascended through the chamber, concentrating all of his will upon moving the bubble upwards until he reached the surface. He took a breath of rather stale air and re-concentrated the bubble again, drawing in more air to replensish that which had been lost.

He drew around half of this extra air into the bubble, creating more mini-vacumns as he did. As the air in the narrow opening thinned out he tempoarily re-directed it beneath his wings and angled himself downwards, towards the mass of enemies. His oxygen replenished, and himself now surrounded by air and vacumns once again, the friction that had previously inhibited his speed was suddenly non-existant and Hawk powered forwards into the water and charged into the mass of creatures.

His passage was so ferocious that no-one was quite sure what had happened. Had the things moved aside for him to save themselves? Had his bubble acted like a shield and knocked them aside? Was his speed simply so great he had slipped through an opening in the wall? Who knows and who cares?! Hawk was through and he continued on his way, not even waiting for the others to catch up.

[Flarecobra]

"Screw it. Let's just get to the end of this thing, and plow right though these monsters." I said from the back. "Besides, if this thing can handle ocean depths, it can just shove things out of the way."

[phil_]

This thing has lasers?! I was expecting a tongue attack at best. Phil silently pounded at the adorable frog-themed controls, hopping and swimming through the swarm. Phil wasn't too worried about the critters; like Flare said, if this thing could handle the ocean's depths, some non-magical beasts, infused with Chaos or not, weren't going to tear the hull anytime soon. No, Phil was much more worried about the multi-headed snake girl named Hydra staring daggers into the back of his head. They were probably poisoned ones, too. He'd have to explain that he meant no offense by the "horrible snake girl" comments. A humboldt squid smashed into the viewing glass, interrupting Phil's narrative-styled and thus non-italicized thoughts.

"Uh, yeah, this thing may be a rental, but it's gotta survive a bit longer. Let's shoot some stuff, aye?" Phil called over his shoulder to the cramped crew, Syttulg and Phoenix in particular, but generally to anyone who could produce magic effects through the hull.

[Tarrin]

Tarrin had seen the swarm and decided that speed would be the way to go with this slight encounter, Moving forward his now mermanesk features powered towards the enraged gagle of sea creatures.

Changing at the very last second Tarrin shot strait down dodging a few of the deadly ninja starfish and sharp hooks from other marine life.
He then flicked his tail and shot into the midst of the cloud of living animals, stopping/ starting shhoting from left to right he emerged from the other side holding three of the deadly ninja starfish grasped in his had, placing the creatures in a leather pouch at his side he decided that they may come in useful later.

[PhoenixFlame]

"Basic? Combos?" Phoenix chuckled, "I skipped the tutorials. This thing is just a ripoff of the X-LX Eclipse Three-seat Strike Craft. Don't worry, I can handle it."

Phoenix's visage popped up on Syttulg's screen. She looked normal, save for the crimson single-eyepiece used by the Gunner chair's VR system. It looked obscurely like a Scouter from DBZ, only with frog graphics. She reached up to flick a red switch on the top of the control panel.

"Switching Primary Controls to 360 Sphere-Gimble Mount"

Phoenix's seat began to rotate and spin like a scene out of "The Last Starfighter".

"Combos are like any other weapons system. We focus fire on a single target, and the Sav-2 should do the rest. But, since we're dealing with a swarm here, let's divide and conquer." She grins.

"Sav. Switch P-Gunnery to quad-PBE array."

"Acknowleged. Switching to Beta-Pulsed Beam Emitter array."

Phoenix swung her gunnery chair vertical and to the left, and sprayed the Frog!Mecha's B-PBE's across a small swarm of fish, ripping them apart as she did so with a rapid steam of energy bolts from four alternating guns.

"See? Just like the simulators..."

[mammothtank]

OOC: Noted. (http://forum.nuklearpower.com/showpost.php?p=469227&postcount=24)

Not too long ago, MT had been happily tinkering with various machines in his garage, his only worry involving how long it would take to get the oil and grease stains out of his shirt. Now, he sat curled into a ball on the floor of an eyebrow-raisingly frog-shaped submarine stuffed at least to maximum capacity and on its way through a magical temple of water that wasn't as devoid of vicious monsters as any sane creature could have hoped.

Oh yes, this was turning out to be an interesting day.

[Lumaes]

A disdainful glance was cast over the froggy tank as it was offered as transport. What did they think he was? An econaught, an ecoranger? Some form of ecowarrior? Damn Hippies.
Instead, he glanced up at the shimmering water above him,
"Water, freakish, in the air, I will traverse with far more flair"
He gathered up his shadows and slipped eel-like into the water, long tenebrous tail churning the water as he does his favourite stroke, the grim-butterly. It was said to be identical to the regular butterly stroke but far scarier and carried out by a figment of death.
***
Then the swarm of deadly sea animals had appeared...
Lumaes slunk close behind Arhra, one could obviously think that once an act of altruism and self-sacrifice had been made those same acts will occur more readily, plus - Lumaes had not always hated Arhra and that was a plus.
His other plan to avoid various ripping and tearing by angry sea-critters was to shout, "I'm a fish I'm a fish I'm a fish I'm a fish I'm a fish" at the top of his... well... not lungs... errr... having to finish this sentence was avoided when he saw a marauding murder cod snapped in half by a hungry... dolphin?
"Not a fish, not a fish, not a fish!"

[Arhra]

To say that Arhra was stunned at the sight of the varied aquatic enemies massed before her would be completely and utterly true. It also gave her the strangest sense of deja-vu. But it was not a time for think, this was a time for violence! Arhra struck at fish that got her near with a whip of bubbles, managing to fend off the murderous creatures with some success, Lumaes chanting "I'm a fish I'm a fish I'm a fish" as he followed in her wake.

Behind her, Lumaes suddenly changed his tune to, "Not a fish, not a fish, not a fish!" Arhra turned partially in puzzlement and saw a Barbed Maiming Squid jetting right at her, wickedly barbed tentacles trailing behind it.

Arhra gasped. Lumaes was right! It wasn't!

She did the only logical thing. Arhra swam sideways to dodge the nasty ramming spike the creature had and grabbed it somewhere not spiky, trying to hold it to keep its flailing tentacles away from her face until her energy draining could siphon off its life. The ink it sprayed out was unpleasant, but livable. The actual murdering felt good - she hadn't killed anything with her vampiric tendencies since the Earth Temple and that had been hours ago! Maybe she'd be able to make ink-clouds or something now.

Reminded that she hadn't stolen any good abilities for quite some time, Arhra did the closest thing to a tackle it was possible to do underwater, wrestling with a laser-shark. It randomly fired off shots as she struggled with it, exploding fish into fleshy chunks and clouds of steam, but, in the end, was no match for Arhra's inhuman powers. Alas, she found she gained no laser ability - it required you to have a frickin' laser attached to your head after. She just felt abraded from the sand-paper like sharkskin. It couldn't be good for her clothes either, although at least this soaking would help get some of the blood from previous battles out.

It was difficult to properly defend oneself with so many enemies all around. They could just come out of nowhere. Arhra narrowly dodged a harpoonfowl that streaked by like greased lightning, a streamlined spear of avian death. They definately couldn't stay out and exposed like this. "We'll go in the wake of the sub!" she declared to Lumaes. "That would be much more protected. It has torpedos and lasers and things for some reason!"

Inside the sub, Hydra was feeling depressed, staring daggers into the back of Phil's head. Having scales, nine heads, snakes for hair, six arms, a tail and being nine feet tall didn't make her a monster, did it? If it didn't why did they keep calling her that? Sure she'd been a hydra, but that was all in the past now, wasn't it? She squirmed slightly in her seat to try and make herself more comfortable in the cramped confines - subs had limited head-room at the best of times.

Next to her, Mammoth was curled up in a fetal ball. Hydra craned a head down to look at him with concern. "Are you alright?" she asked him, trying to school her serpentine features into a friendly expression.

At that moment, with a screeching tear, a beak burst through the wall Mammoth was curled up against, just a foot or so above him. It opened and clacked, making a low, menacing penguin sound. Water began to leak in around it as the harpoonfowl sought to pull its beak back out. The lights in the sub flickered as a high voltage electric eel slid against the hull. Hydra didn't have a good feeling about this.

* * *

Hawk continued ahead of the others, having somehow found his way through the swirling maelstrom of angry fishies. He came to a lush room, various drapes subdividing it and peices of odd furniture scattered around. A table with a rather decadent looking meal appropriate for underwater consumption was off to one side.

"Well, well, well... What do we have here?" the voice came, flowing and dark, "A little bird, come all on his own to where he shouldn't be? Why don't we make him welcome?"

The speaker became clear, moving out from behind a drape that billowed slightly in the current. He was a merman of incredible good looks, an ornate trident grasped in one hand and a curious looking staff in the other. He radiated dark seductiveness, which seemed to serve him quite well, judging by the dozen or so women emerging to flock about him.

The women were also sea-going creatures, all extremely beautiful and dressed to show this off. Some were mermaids, gliding with playful swishes of their fishy tails, while others were nymphs, skin a pale green or blue and their fishy characteristics far more subtle. Three were slightly more unusual, almost human save for some unearthly refinement to their features, pale skinned, long green hair and green fire in their eyes. They seemed to be slightly closer to the merman than the others.

Enticing expresisons on their faces and cruel amusement in their eyes, the Dark Merman's little harem split up, swimming to encircle Hawk in an ever tightening circle and they sang, the same song that had led many sailors to their doom. The same cruel twinkle in his eyes, the Dark Merman gestured imperiously with his trident, seaweed moving over the two doors leading out of the room and knotting itself into a thick, tangled barrier.

OOC: Hawk's alone against a sub-boss (http://forum.nuklearpower.com/showpost.php?p=469403&postcount=25). I pity da foo!

[Flarecobra]

"Damnit!" I said, as I got up and climbed over other fourmites to get at the reapir kit, and was glad to see hull patches in it. Taking one to fit, I reached into the first-aid pack and pulled out some alka-selzer, then shoved it down the bird's throat, the gas in the harpoonfowl's belly expanded, until it exploded. Then I pushed the beak out and put the hull patch in place, using the patch paste to seal it in and make it waterproof.


(And that is why seagulls shouldn't eat alka-selzer too)

[mauve]

"Ah," Mauve said, rubbing her chin. "I never knew that about birds and alka-selzer. They have a sort of... Mentos and Cola effect. Good to know." Mauve made a mental note of this in her 'Things That Don't Mix Well' list. Currently said list included bleach and ammonia, pepsi and paint jobs on cars, and bubble soap and dishwashing machines, among other things.

Stepping carefully around the puddles of water and the shivering MT, Mauve made her way to a window and looked out at the swarm of killer sea life. She soon discovered that it was possible to cast spells through the thick glass of the window. She also discovered that evil fish didn't like being frozen in a block of ice. This kept her amused for some time.

[mammothtank]

"I... d-don't... l-like... submarrriness..." MT stuttered, shivering from both the cold water and his own nerves. It was nearly all he could do to keep his teeth from chattering. Looking up as Mauve stepped past him, he watched as she began casting ice spells here and there through the transparent hull. The sight of oncoming fish being stopped mid-charge by a blast of ice was enough to take his attention away from his discomfort, but he still eagerly awaited the opportunity to disembark onto land.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

This was bad. No, it was worse than that, it was beyond impossible. There was no-way on earth that Hawk could fight these opponents. His concentration was focused mostly on keeping himself alive and that was about all he could do. He could not hope to survive if he decided to fight.

So he didn't.

In the distance he could pick up the sounds of explosions, the sound traveling quite well through the water. The others were on their way, so his best bet would be to wait for backup. Time to enter distraction mode!

Concentrating all of his will on the sounds of battle from the direction he had just come, Hawk attempted to block out the song of the various siren-like beings. That, and the fact that he wasn't a sailor, was all that he was counting on to keep him safe from them for the time being.

He then proceeded to enter hostile negotiations with the Merman.

"I am terribly sorry for this intrusion into your private domain my good friend, but if you would be so kind as to open the door to the exit, I would be delighted to leave you and your women in peace."

At this point, Hawks eyes narrowed and his demeener darkened.

"IF, however, you decide to stand before us and begin taking hostile actions, a rather large frog-shaped, laser toting submarine is going to blow open this room and obliterate you in about five minutes!"

He paused and let this last sentance sink in slightly, mainly for dramatic effect. He didn't think this Merman was going to listen anyway, but if he could just keep him busy and delay any murderous tendancies he might have, well, all the better for Hawk.

"So what's it gona be?"

[PhoenixFlame]

In her mind's eye, Phoenix felt a great disturbance in the force.

"IF, however, you decide to stand before us and begin taking hostile actions, a rather large frog-shaped, laser toting submarine is going to blow open this room and obliterate you in about five minutes!"

She imagined that someone had just asked her to save him, in a roundabout, very un-NPFly fashion. Nawh. It couldn't have been.

*Warning! Hull Breach!*

*Warning, Tertiary Power Grid Surge!*

*Warning, Crew Morale Low!*

"Huh?" Phoenix looked curiously at the last indicator light. That was odd... The sub had a morale sensor? Nifty. As she continued to blast hordes of fishies with the submarine's main guns, she noticed a very large, very seaweed-filled door looming in her forward field of view.

"Er, Pilot? Pilot!" Phoenix tried to comm Sttylug or someone. Whoever was piloting the damn thing, didn't he realise they were about to crash?! Yet, it was too late. The Frog-Sub burst through the door like so much chaff, filling a good portion of the boss chamber with gun-sprouting submarine, and, through no fault of her own, Phoenix accidently answered Hawk's prayer.

*Hostiles Detected!*
*Biological, Hawk-Mutant*
*Biological, Merman*
*Biological, Mermaid Cadre*

It was a very peppy computer, in fact, Phoenix quite liked it's spunk.

"Target the Merman and Fire!" Phoenix commanded, knowing that obviously, the unique fish-like entity was their leader. Poor Merman-man would soon find himself staring down the barrels of two very angry looking Beta Particle Accellerator Cannons. Despite emitting piercing charge-up shreiks or glowing a deadly azure blue, they were very happy to see him.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

Juat a second after his last sentence, the frog-sub made its dramatic entrance into the chamber.

"Whoops! Make that five seconds then!"

He then retreated to the far corner for safety reasons before Pheonix had a chance to open fire and fry him. He had a sneaking suspicion that the machines on-board computer systems may have just picked him up as a hostile element and seeing as the NPFers occasionaly got a little over-zealous with the killing, it was probably better to make himself as inconspicious as possible.

[phil_]

Moments earlier...

Phil dodged and kicked through the swarm of angry fishies as well as an amphibian-shaped sub can when piloted by an amatuer. Suddenly, he was out! No more bangs on the hull, a clear whining coming from MT's direction. It was a little eerie. Angry fishies don't just stay in their spawn room. This isn't Zelda, Phil thought. Immediately before him was a large, ornate door that was holding up nicely in it's new watery surroundings. Normally, Phil would've stopped and thought about who or what could be behind the door; pondered how to proceed. A gentle knock? Politely opening the door with a metal flipper and calling through? But not today. Today, something possesed him to act, probably exposure to NPFer cooties.

Phil slammed the Frogsub through the door with a "Rrraagh!" The sub started to identify targets. Something about the bishi-merman seemed significant, but, as Phil hadn't adventured into the watery depths after saving Santa, he knew nothing about him. Puzzled, he stopped and let the gunners take aim.

[Bailey]

"YOU!" Syttulg said, seeing the Merman. "You incited the persona war!" He locked on. A large flashing light came on. |Both target locks on same subject. Activate combo attacks?| Syttulg's face widened into a grin as he slammed the "yes" button.

[Arhra]

"You!" Arhra shouted at the Dark Merman, having recognised their recurring nemesis. "You're supposed to be dead! Unhand our emergency food supply at once!" Arhra felt fairly safe about this, hiding as she was behind the bulk of the frog-sub. This was not the most hope inspiring line she could have uttered, but at least it did indicate some concern for Hawk's current wellbeing.

Just before now, she'd been patting herself on the back for guiding herself and Lumaes to safety. It had all been rather impressive. She doubted that it could have been any more impressive in a perfect world, unless someone had shown up afterwards to grant her a medal or something along those lines. Arhra settled back to watch the show. After all, they had a batrachian submersible and it was armed with a variety of directed energy projectiles, manually guided concussives and particle-stream weaponry for some reason. What could possibly top that? It probably didn't even have italics!

"What a pretty little toy." the Dark Merman remarked, "But playtime is over children." He waved his trident imperiously, the magical weapon shining with an azure glow. As the frog-sub's weapons prepared to fire, there was a sudden, massive surge in the water, slamming it to one side. The combined attack fired as the frog-sub was knocked into a corner with crushing force, turrets skewed wildly off center, hitting the walls and ceiling harmlessly. Seeing Lumaes and Arhra suddenly revealed from their hiding place behind the sub, the Dark Merman's lips quirked into the beginnings of a smile. With his other hand, he pointed the mysterious staff he held and it throbbed with strange power. A bolt of energy leapt from its end, Lumaes to be pierced by it.

With the effects of his first two strikes still unfolding, the seconds stretched out as the Dark Merman softly shook his head, long hair flicking out and floating gently back into its former position, a mischevious light in his eyes. It only heightened his appeal, but one final element was missing. And then he smiled.

Arhra reeled as if he'd exploded instead. It was like having fireworks go off in her brain, threatening to banish coherent thought with a mindless rush of desire and longing. She wanted to embrace the aquatic charmer. She wanted to strangle the fishy bastard. Her thoughts spun. She'd fallen for his charms before, she wouldn't fall for it a second time! She had forgotten what it had been like...

Hydra had never seen the Dark Merman before and she had not known what to expect. The power of that smile had caught her off guard, boring into her brains like a lust crazed beetle. Even as she registered the jolting shock of being knocked about by the sub's rough crash, the mental shock was profoundly greater. She was in several minds about this whole business and unfortunately they'd settled into two main camps - pro-Merman and Confused. She writhed in her seat, her multiple heads snapping at one another, embroiled in conflict.

The Dark Merman's harem had chosen to target the stricken submarine. Their song was all around, coming through the submairne's speakers and, more softly, through the hull itself. Come to us, it said, come to our embrace. Some pawed at the windows, their faces unbearably lovely, enchantment about them. Pallid hands sought to grip at the entry hatches for the sub, seeking to open them from the outside.

Still riven with inner conflict, Arhra realised she'd lost sight of the Dark Merman. With sudden, grave premonition she looked up. A shapely hand held a sprig of mistletoe over her head. As if in a dream, Arhra slowly turned, eyes tracing the tanned arm down to where it connected to the lean, toned torso of the Dark Merman. He raised a single eyebrow suggestively and then blasted her with his smile again. Seeing his pearly white teeth was like staring into the Sun. Arhra reeled again as he drew her in. This was not a good situation!

OOC: Hmm, I realised that after writing this, that Hawk is in a corner, and the frog-sub just got knocked into a corner. Murphy's Law states... well, you get the rest. And if you're wondering how the Merman's carrying a staff, a trident and a sprig of mistletoe, he's holding the trident and the staff in the same hand. Geeze, do I have to explain everything? Also, his first smile would have caught everyone looking in the right direction.

[Flarecobra]

"Geez, that call that singing?" I said, taking out a couple of earplugs and tossing thrm out, while putting in a set into my own ears. <Ok, they want noise? I'll give them noise...> I thought to myself, thankful that military training helped to resist the song, and hopefully can help me last until I get my pan off, as I grab a missile and start to disassemble it, intent on removing the warhead.

[PhoenixFlame]

The sub rocked violently, and Phoenix's weapons crosshair slammed vertically, the weapons harmlessly striking the ceiling despite the submarine's onboard shock-reduction stabilizer systems and secondary turret re-aligning software designed to keep weapons locked on their targets despite rocking due to turbulance or weapons fire. Phoenix noted that both systems must have been miscalibrated. She didn't doubt it, since Syttulg's or however you pronounced his name! Submarine was obviously poorly maintenanced.

"Keep an eye on him! Keep an eye on him!" Phoenix shouted to the computer, re-angling the external cameras to stay locked on her target. As soon as she re-acquired her lock, the Merman smiled... It was at Arhra, really, but Phoenix caught part of the smile too. She jerked sideways in her chair's crash webbing, and became remarkably confused.

"Weapons charging. Preparing to fire..."

"Fire? Wait... Why are we?" Phoenix said in a confused daze... "Yes, no, FIRE! Kill him!" soon snapping back and seizing the joystick, dropping the crimson crosshair over the merman and clicking it's fire button with fervored madness. The weapon fired once and again, deadly particle-packet bolts of violet streaking toward the Dark Merman. And in her 4x magnification scope... he smiled.

And Phoenix reeled again. The songs too, of the mermaids now began to affect her. She felt the urge to get out of the submarine and go... Go kis... Kiss him, with her plasma rifle... Yeah... She felt very, very confused, and simply slumped sideways in her gunner's chair, a small stream of drool running down her chin. The computer noted her incapacitation, and took the initiative to assist. It was a weird feeling... She didn't even like mermen...

"Now that you are suffering from a mind-control effect, this next battle could take a very, very long time. If you become light-headed from confusion, feel free to pass out. An intubation probe will be sent to revive you with a peptic salve and adrenaline." The computer's soothing female voice assured her, as a tiny robotic arm carrying a very large needle popped out of a dorsal panel and stabbed her in the neck with it's combat resuscitation drugs.

"This isn't intubation..." was all Phoenix was able to think as her mind suddenly lit on fire (figuratively) from overstimulation.

[Tarrin]

Tarrin finnished dodging the few pieces of rock that fell from the roof where the laser had hit, looking around he found the sub had been pushed into a corner one he was sure Hawk had been in a few moments ago.

Continuing his scan of the area he saw the sirens and heard their singing, however being a spiritual person the sexual urges that these musical minxes sent forth had little to no effect on hawk.

After all the only woman that would effect him was a small but illustrius list consisting of:
Alyssa Milano
Jennifer Love-Hewitt
Jessica Alba
Kirsten Kruiek
Seeing how the sirens were none of these then Tarrin was able to ignore the music and continue the search of the area.

At last his gaze fell apon one of the most startling sights ever to beheld, Arhra held in a gentle embrace with the Dark Merman their lips moving closer and closer to each other, This both scared and puzzled Tarrin, but he was able to regain his sences and swim towards the couple.

Tarrin swam with all speed towards the enigma that was arhra and the Dark Merman, at the last second Tarrins tail lashed out and smashed the distracted merman in the side of the head ripping him from Arhra's embrace and sending him flying a short distance, it took the merman little time to regain his stability and when he did the look given to Tarrin was both cold and vengeful, swallowing hard tarrin called forth his Spirit lance and readied himself for the retaliation that was to come.

[phil_]

The siren song was having interesting effects on Phil. On one hand, he was a hobbit, and thus had +1 to all saving throws. On the other hand, Phil was a very lonely boy. And on the other other hand that someone had left to cure in a pickle jar, Phil was painfully insecure around unfamiliar, attractive women.

With this in mind, let's enter Phil's train of thought.

Woah, they're hot. No! They're evil and trying to trick you! They want me to come outside... where they'll have the tactical advantage! But I can just henshin into my space suit, I'd be fine. But do they really want me to go out there? Why would they want me? I'm just some scuzzy little hobbit. I'm sure they're just calling the skelington or Mammothtank. Mammoth... with his heroic aura and fancy ride. Chicks love nice cars, and he has a tank. An F-ing tank! How can I compete with that?!

Phil shot a hateful, squinty-eyed glare at MT, then suddenly turned back to the controls and grabbed the sides of his face, Shinji-style.

What am I thinking?! I have to, I dunno, kick them or something with the Frogsub. I have to pilot the sub! For America!

Phil pounced across the sub at the trembling Mammothtank, screaming, "You think you're so cool with your damn tank! I'll kill you!"

Luckily for MT, Phil wasn't exactly a powerful melee fighter. There was a bit of frenzied scratching and pitiful whining noises that may have been intended as battle cries, but it wasn't as dangerous as the fact that now the sub was pilotless.

[Arhra]

In the frog-sub, things looked to be going from bad to worse. Hydra was wrestling with her raging desire and, because of that, herself. Phil, the submarine's hobbit pilot was busy scrapping with Mammoth, at an initial defensive low from his fetal crouch. The Computer, being the friend of all aboard as it was, had decided the best way to assist Phoenix was pumping her full of combat drugs. The rotation of a hatch handle seemed to indicate a nymph had breached the outer door and was working on the inner. Thankfully the airlock system meant she'd not be able to open both doors at once.

And last, but not least, Flare was in the middle of attempting to disassemble a warhead. This is a nerve racking job at the best of times, but when you're attempting to do it on an uneven surface, in tight confines, in the midst of battle, several allies fighting each other nearby and distracting, alluring siren song in the background, well...

Hydra choose this moment to, in her externalised internal conflict, fall out of her seat, onto Flare's work.

Er... BOOM?

* * *

The sprig of mistletoe wafted gently to the floor, knocked from the Dark Merman's grasp and forgotten as his vicious retaliation against Tarrin began.

He laughed at Tarrin's actions, transfering his staff back to his free hand. "Oh, feeling jealous are we?" he asked, seeming very amused. His eyes seemed slightly unfocused from the whallop to the head, but it was swiftly wearing off.

"Or are you trying to be a gentleman?" The Dark Merman asked, pausing to look introspective at this. Then his eyes flashed with dark humour and he lunged forwards, biffing Tarrin in the gut with the end of his staff.

"Really, I think you'd make a much better woman." he finished, as transformative magic crackled over the spirit walker. He twisted lithely, a few swishes of his tail pushing him back away from Tarrin (Tarrina?), to better view the result.

He was sure that she'd be very pretty when she was angry, so he raised his trident to toss her about with its powers over the currents. The trident's tip glowed with azure light and then faded. The Dark Merman looked at it in confusion and found Arhra clutching on to it, suppressing its power with her draining... power. She tried to hit him with her free hand, but found herself unable to do it. Eyes blazing with fury at this, she gained the mental strength to lash out again, kicking not at him, but at his staff.

Arhra used her hold on the trident for leverage, foot swishing up to kick the Dark Merman's staff out of his other hand. As it clattered to the ground, rolling away from him, Arhra wrenched his trident out of his surprised hand and hefted it at him, point weaving uncertainly.

The Dark Merman's gaze flicked down the haft of the weapon held waveringly at his chest and travelled up to Arhra's eyes, she was attempting to keep averted. He smiled a strange smile, plucked the trident out of her unresisting grip and pulled her into a tight embrace with his other hand.

"Oh look, I get the girl too." he said archly, and then bent his head down, Arhra pulling her rebreather out of her mouth, and kissed her passionately on the lips. She spasmed once and then was still.

Arhra had been pleasantly surprised to find that she'd managed disarm the Dark Merman of both his weapons. now all she had to do was plunge the spear through his sexy, muscular chest and into his shrivelled heart! In her mind she could see the look of shock crossing his perfect features, those deep, dark eyes asking her why? How could she - No! Thinking about it was bad, she just had to do it!

Trying not to look at him, she readied herself to strike and then he'd smiled and everything but her and him had dissolved into rosy pastels and sparkles. She'd let the trident's keen blade drop, her eyes gazing at him with adoration. He'd gently taken the weapon away, pulling her against him. She pressed in agaisnt him as his face moved against hers and she struggled to strip away the oppressive rebreather. Then she'd felt his lips, senses suddenly overloaded with searing passion, the last thing she saw was his dark eyes as oblivion claimed her.

The Dark Merman released Arhra, letting her body float. "Well my love," he said to Tarrin, "Let us see what you are made of."

OOC: That may not have looked good for you Tarrin, but the staff's no longer in his hands, and his little aside with Arhra (I came up with a plan for a dream I wanted to do) should give you a nice opening. I would have written more of a fight, but I didn't know if the spirit lance was able to block or be blocked by physical weapons. Feel free to have a more indepth fight with him now. You get righteous anger now too!

[Bailey]

The song came to Syttulg just as clearly as it reached the ears of anyone else, but there was one major difference here. After the prior fiasco involving the merman, all or the personas that were part of The Eternal Newb had been required to take a course called Self Defense Against Sexy Seabeasts, and thus he was slightly more resistant than he might have otherwise been. Chanting formulas and tables to himself to drown out the singing, he pulled out the stack of books and checked Oh No! More Monsters! quickly, then made a quick adjustment to himself. It felt weird to be genderless, but it did mean that he couldn't fall under the effects of the attract status effect. He switched the turrets into automatic mode, and, seeing that Pheonix was... disabled. He set the primaries on automatic too. With that, he climbed down the ladder, and found himself staring at a room covered in pink. He didn't know why she had done it, but apparently Flare had decided to tear apart the ink missile used to create obscuring clouds underwater for a quick getaway, and the thing had exploded. He looked around further, and saw a rabid hobbit attacking a frightened knight. And it seemed that something was scratching at the door. He sighed, and strode over to the cabinet labeled Adventurin' Gear.

Quick searching yielded a lump of wax larger than any beehive had a right to be, duct tape, rope, a knife, a towel, WD40, and, for some reason, a mix cd containing "Every time we touch" "I feel pretty" and "Barbie girl", among others. Not one to question his luck, Syttulg immediately put the CD into the sub's sound system and cranked it to full volume.

[mammothtank]

MT, not one to miss a beat in combat, skillfully defended against Phil's ferocious assault. This involved flailing his arms blindly in Phil's direction and hoping for the best, which was not nearly as effective as the previous sentence would suggest. On top of that, everything had suddenly turned pink, and the Sirens' songs were basically impossible to ignore. All of this combined to make MT unable to do so much as think.

Presently, the siren song found itself competing with some of the most awful music known to popular culture. This interruption returned enough of MT's presence of mind to him to allow him to do something about his predicament. With all his will and strength, MT stood up as quickly and forcefully as he could and shouted, "Snap out of it, Phil! Gah!"

Only then did it occur to him to wonder why everything was pink.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

Where was Hawk during this entire fiasco battle? Why, he was making himself inconspicious, as his previous post had implied, aren't you paying attention or something?!

Anyway, he had been using this time constructively of course, observing the battle and making plans.

In other words, he was hiding out of the way and bemusedly trying to figure out who was supposed to be fighting who, as his acute hearing picked up the obvious sounds of npf teamkilling coming from within the sub, along with the well known sounds of an exploding paint torpedo.

And then, as he scanned the room his eyes sighted upon the now discarded staff, which only seconds ago had apparently turned Tarrin into a female. Putting two and two together Hawk realised what this meant.

"The Staff of Gender Inversion!" He gasped, recognising the fabled weapon. "I MUST have it!"

Hawk dived towards the floor of the chamber, dodging past one of the mermans' mermaids without daring to look at her and scooped up the staff in his talons, and flew off out of immediate attacking range before anyone had a chance to stop him.

Knowledge of ancient weapons such as this was something that Hawk had great knowledge of, and it was because of this knowledge that Hawk knew exactly what this weapon was capable of. He wheeled about and directed the staff towards the Dark Merman.

"Let's see how much charm you have when you're the buffest lesbian hermaphrodite drag-queen chav this side of the pond!"

As he said the words, light began charging up at the tip of the staff. With all of his will, Hawk unleashed the bolt.

[Flarecobra]

I jumped back in surprise when Hydra fell on the missile, fully expecting it to go off. "Hey, you ok? I asked it in a serpentine language, and checking over the damage, and seeing that the detonator was sheared off, thus making the warhead unable to explode. "Damnit." I said, and decided to go for my second plan. Let the Fire sort things out. I started charging up my Mega-Flare, then lept out of the sub, firing on the loestest set of heram girls. "Sorry girls, but I'm already got a girlfriend." I said with a smirk as I looked for my next target, my spear at the ready.

[Tarrin]

Tarrin was struck by the beam and the world swirled as colors mixed and shimmered before his eyes.

Wait make that HER eyes, “What the fu…” was the first thing that came to mind then a whole slew of other things that involved being a girl.
1. Extra sick days citing “woman’s problems”
2. The ability to go to a bar and get drunk on $10 because every guy would buy drinks
3. Finally getting to go watch the notebook and being able to cry without ppl looking at you funny

All these were fine points to being a woman there was just one problem, Tarrin liked being a guy he’d been one his whole life…well apart from that one time…

Looking over at the merman he watched as Arhra struggled slightly before she was locking lips with him, taking the advantage Tarrin charged and just as he got there the merman turned and said something he didn’t quiet catch.

The dark merman’s eyes widened as the spirit lance arced downwards, he still had presence of mind enough to raise his hands in defense, not that it mattered without his magical trident to block the attack the lance passed thru his hands and body ripping at the merman’s soul.

Having such a strong and powerful soul the spirit lance couldn’t kill him that easily, however the pain that wracked the merman’s body was immense and the scream of pain was like honey to Tarrins ears.
The only draw back was the high pitch of the scream, was it high enough to crack the subs windows? Tarrin had no idea but he knew that and glasses around were definitely worse for ware.

Feeling the burning pain the merman swatted at Tarrin with his tail gaining a little room between him and the psychotic mermaid, looking Tarrin square in the eyes the Merman once again flashed his smile, the smile would melt hearts and even had the power to enchant Arhra.
What it didn’t have the power over however was one spear wielding, pmsing and generally pissed off newly made mermaid.

Tarrin lurched him/herself towards the enemy again the spirit lance sweeping thru the water unopposed heading towards the merman once again.

[mauve]

Mauve was huddled on the floor on the sub, pressing her palms over her ears and squeezing her eyes shut. She appeared to be whimpering something to herself.

"Nononooo... Wanted to forget this... so badly... Not again... Embarassing moments... so many embarassing and bad moments... gonna need more therapy..." Somehow Mauve had managed to turn away before the merman o' sexiness came fully into view. The realization that the merman was still alive, however, triggered a whole load of memories of the LAST time Mauve met the merman, which put her into a momentary embarrassment/terror overload.

"Not happening again..." she whimpered pitifully, leaning forwards and pressing her forehead against her knees. "Don't wanna-- OW!!! Hey!!!" Phil and MT had "fought" too close to Mauve's breakdown spot, and Mauve got a boot to the shin. The pain tore her from her panic attack, leaving her as her sweet and compassionate self.

"Hey! Watch it!" Mauve snarled at the two men locked in combat (sort of). She shook her head violently, fighting the urge to turn around and look out the glass window of the sub at the merman of hawtness. Focus on something else. She did NOT want this to go the direction it went last time. She shuddered. Carefully the mage reached out and grabbed at Phil's collar, dodging misplaced punches and flailing arms.

"Cut it out, you two!" she commanded, trying to separate them. But her words probably fell on deaf ears, seeing as how she ended up catching an elbow in the face on accident and they didn't even aknowledge her as she stumbled to the side.

"Oh, that is IT!" she sputtered angrily, rubbing the spot on her jaw. She held her hands out in front of her. Setting one of them on fire should get their attention. "Firag--" The words died in her throat. "Oh dear..." As she looked up at them to cast the spell, a sudden realization hit her. She was now facing the window. The one with the merman outside of it. Mauve had a pretty good view.

Part of her wanted to close her eyes, but that part was being kicked repeatedly by the part that said "ZOMGSEXY!!" Mauve pushed Phil out of her way, somewhat listlessly, and walked dazedly between the two fighters towards the window.

Gotta look away! Gotta kill him... Or stare dreamily at him. Y'know, whatever.... NO!! Can't fall for this trick again! I have to break fr... Wow, he's got a great smile. ACK! NO!

[Lumaes]

Shadows spasmed and twisted tempestously in the air as Lumaes was skewered by the gender-inversion beam. This black, roiling mass thrashed violently as it slammed into the chamber floor.
Obscured from sight, a dark happening happened.
A white, ancient hand rises from the crater. It groped blindly for a hold. A chill current washed through the water, kicking up a faint swirl in the murky crater-tossed fluid. Lumaes rose up imperiously, eyes blazing with eldritch light but Lumaes was Lumaes no more...

Madame Lume settled old-fasioned sunglasses over her dread gaze, tugging at the dark shawl which shadowed her pale, ivory skull.
"Darhlings, what is this nonsense" she trilled breathlessly, taking a soothing drag on the end of her cigarette holder, from which a thin trickle of smoke continued to coil despite its surrounds. She sashayed up through the water, her generous hips parting the fluid easily.
Her voice was heavilly perfumed and rasped throatilly from too many years of lung abuse, she doffed her glasses, gazing over their ornate rims at the surrounding carnage.

The centre of all this Drama seemed to be a devilishly handsome fish, with a wry smirk Madame Lume noted that none of the other 'ladies' here had anything on her class and experience, look at those flagrant hussies throwing themselves at him in their skimpy attire. It was an affront to womankind. Those fishy-harlots had no class. If Lume had anything to do with it they shortly would have no teeth either.

With a cock of the hips the femme fatale glid through the water, the ends of her impressive mink stole wavering in her wake. The harem was distracted, having swarmed down on Flare in a mess of scratching and kicking. A skeletal hand seized a handfull of sea-green hair, yanking it back fiercly. a shadowy elbow crashing down wickedly on a fine-boned nymph nose with a sickening crack. Hipbarging another suprised sea-hag aside the Madame joined the scrap in earnest.

[Arhra]

"Wha?" Hydra muttered as Flare seemed to start hissing. Hydra was no Parseltongue. The pain of falling and hitting one's back on a partially dissassembled torpedo had helped clear her head. The sheer bewilderment of suddenly everything being pink also left no room for any other emotion. The airlock chose this time to swing open, a cascade of water pouring through, followed by a nymph stepping through, the wetness making her thin garments cling to her lovely frame. Her eyes widened slightly in surprise seeing the chaos of the sub's interior and then she flinched, as terrible music suddenly blared out.

"Uh... hello?" Hydra said.

Flare seemed to have neglected a few pertinent details in her plan. Water does have quite a dampening effect on fire spells and tends to be difficult to breathe after all. The Merman's harem laughed at her as the Mega-Flare spell was quashed by the cool, uncaring presence of the water, the plume of steam it created swiftly swirling away. They swam up at her, unhindered by the watery environment, swarming the armour encumbered Flare like sharks. Their song was loud in her ears, their allure thrown in her face, her spear snagged by their superior numbers and grasping hands and they snatched at her armour, stripping it off her piece by piece.

But two things came to her aid. The siren-like creatures screeched in pain as the water suddenly boomed with high volume music, coveirng their ears to block out the dreadful sound. Their attacks wavered and then the imposing, skeletal figure of Madam Lume hit their ranks like a cannonball, intent on destroying these obstacles in the way of her beloved's affection.

Further away, many things were happening.

"Let's see how much charm you have when you're the buffest lesbian hermaphrodite drag-queen chav this side of the pond!" Hawk shouted, using the Dark Merman's own weapon against him.

Unfortunately for Hawk's plan, the fabled Staff of Gender Inversion was still set to Sexy. It wasn't one of those new-fangled magical artifacts where will alone was enough. It certainly helped, but several mysterious notched rings inset on the staff, able to be clicked around to various configurations, controlled this functionality.

The Dark Merman, hurt by Tarrin's blow to his soul wasn't able to dodge Hawk's shot. He spasmed, hips widening, waist narrowing and his chest... fortunately the staff seemed to alter clothing for genders too. Thus the new, far bustier, mer-creature was no longer barechested. Her hair was perhaps an inch longer for the Dark Merman had been of the long haired pretty-boy persuasion and, for similar reasons her face had not changed much, simply shifting into something a touch more feminine.

The newly christened Dark Mermaid tossed her silky black hair. "Quite a lot, little birdy." He.. she... didn't really seem very put out by it. Perhaps he.. she had experimentated with the staff's power before. She smiled impishly, tossing everyone an alluring look. To everyone's possible dismay, it seemed the Dark Mermaid's charming power was working exactly as it had before the change. On the plus side, it meant one part of Hawk's description had come true. She swished her trident, the water moving to crush Hawk against a wall and burst his bubble, and then swam at Tarrin, trident held ahead to spear him.

Arhra was still floating.

* * *

Arhra lay languid beneath the canopied exapanse of the bed. Her eyes were closed, a tiny slit showing the crimson iris sleeping beneath, pupil vacant. A dressing gown was loosely thrown over her supine figure, the eye could trace her face, down the arch of her pale neck, past the hollow of her throat, along the smooth profile of the cleavage revealed by closing V of the gown's neck. She lay still, the only sign of life the gentle rise and fall of her chest.

The room about her was rich and opulent, the darkness in the corners slowly creeping inwards. The light only truely illuminated the bed and the door, all else was in shadows and wavered like a dream. This door was like some ancient gate, bejweled and golden. Behind that door was the one she held dearest of all, and she waited for them as the dark closed around her.

The gate opened.

Through it came Arhra. Or perhaps an idealisation of Arhra, for she had a definate lack of the one thing Arhra hated about her current form - shortness. Elegance was the call of the day, for she wore a black, strapless evening gown, deliberately offsetting her paleness. It possessed some slight iridescence that suggested a subtle play other hues as she walked and her dark hair flowed down her back. Her main adornment was a necklace, set with a gem like a lustrous black opal, fires in its depths. Other than that, she had jewelry of a bronzy metal, onrately patterned in a manner that matched the necklace, but devoid of any other additions.

"Oh come on! This is far too obvious!" Arhra declared, suddenly sitting up on the bed. The sight had reminded her of certain realities.

"If I felt like being obvious, I would have come as a knight in shining armour. Well, not shining, but you know what I mean." the other Arhra retorted as she glided across the room. "I'm quietly certain even that would, well, you know." she waved one hand over her head vaguely, passing above by a few inches. "Besides, its not like they can see into dreams."

"That's beside the point!" Arhra said. "Don't you have stuff you're supposed to be doing?"

"Oh, not really. Mere presence is enough, although it is a little hard on the knees. And anyway, what could possibly be more important than me?!" As Arhra nodded in agreement, her doppelganger shot her a sly look, "Speaking of too obvious, what are you wearing under that dressing gown?"

Arhra thought about this. "I... don't know." Further thought about this matter prompted her to add, "I'm not sure if I want to know." Final thoughts about this matter made her move the folds of her dressing gown to a more modest neckline.

The other Arhra demurely sat down on the bed next to her and politely changed the topic, "You're looking well. Have you been working out?"

"That whole debacle with the Capitalist remember!" Arhra said exasperatedly, "First there was that troll fruit... then those weird weakening fruit, then the out of control strengthening spell... then the vomiting up of the weakening fruit later on!"

Laughter was the other Arhra's reply, as she put an arm about her twin, "Oh right, I remember now. Heh, that troll-fruit made you look fat. Still, it worked out all right. A little more brawn goes well with that tomboy look you seem to be going for lately. I think the all black outfit needs more contrast though."

"You're a dream! Why are you acting as my stylist?!" Arhra asked, desperate to change the topic of the conversation again.

"I'm given to understand that this sort of thing is expected in these situations. Just felt I should make some conversation. Anyway, since you seem to have forgotten, you're here because the Dark Merman put you into some sort of erotic coma by kissing you. I'm here to tell you that." the other Arhra said, perfectly straight faced, "Now wake up before you drown."

"How do I do that?" Arhra said, finally noticing the darkness slowly swallowing the room.

The other Arhra sighed, the arm that was wrapped around Arhra pulling to make her lean against her. She gently cupped Arhra's chin, raising her face to look into her eyes. Tension was suddenly throbbing in the air between them. To Arhra, it made the difference in their heights finally register. As the other Arhra's face drew closer, Arhra could see her own face reflected in her twin's eyes. Her heart fluttered as their mirrored faces hovered just inches apart. This was it. Then the other Arhra headbutted her between the eyes. Everything went dark.

[Bailey]

It had been forever since Syttulg had heard this stuff. It was just as good as he remembered it! He began to sing along on the chorus, his deep voice and the distortion of the water combining to form an eerie quality.

"'Cause every time we touch, I get this feeling."

Syttulg grabbed up the wax and the knife when the door burst open, and hurried over to the door to seal it back up. That done, he hit a button to pump the water back out. He realized that fleshy land types had serious trouble breathing water. It seemed a little odd, but whatever.

"And every time we kiss, I swear I can fly"

He did the equivalentof cracking his knuckles, which in this case was folding his arm blades away and then unfolding them sharper.

"Can't you feel my heart beat fast, I want this to last,"

He hurled himself into the fray, slicing away at the sirens.

"Need you by my side!"

The addition of not only more singing but also more blades seemed to worsen their shock and confusion, causing them to flee towards the door, only to find that it was now sealed back up. Syttulg grinned as he pounced.

"'Cause every time we touch, I feel the static,"

The sirens definitely didn't like this, and began to try fighting back by increasing their own volumes, but the pervasiveness of the songs on the mix cd drowned out the sirens easily. After all, it had a strong beat and actual lyrics, whereas the sirens were charming people with a wordless tune that rose and fell in an intricate pattern.

"And every time we kiss, I reach for the sky,"

This song was the raging barbarian swinging a greataxe at five nimble fencers. And now, the blows were actually connecting.

"Can't you hear my heart beat so I can't let you go,"

On a purely academic level, Syttulg felt a little sorry for the sirens as he sliced them with his arm blades, adding electrical bursts to a couple of swings for added damage.

"Want you in my life!"

[PhoenixFlame]

*KBOOM* The sound of a detonating skipper missile rocked the Sub, and Phoenix wondered to herself if Flare had been playing with warheads again. Or maybe it was just the sound of the primary gunner seat's number-2 PaC overloading and exploding from the damage to the submarine? Only God knew, and he wasn't telling.

"Wait, was thaAHH!"

*CRASHBKRASH!* Suddenly, the compression wave shattered every single glass instrument panel in Phoenix's gunner seat, including the ball her chair was nestled in. Today had just gone from bad to much, much worse. Now showered with razor-bits in her magely vital-bits, the "intubation" probe took the necessary time to malfunction, spark wildly, and inject Phoenix with a potent Neural-toxin instead of adreneline. She slumped sideways and lost conciousness. If only she had worn armor, she might have survived.

Though, it was common to be killed when working with the NPF, and Phoenix had worked very thoroughly to make sure she remained alive. Luckily, her various "forms" were merely... Oh, why, you got the description earlier anyway. Summoner Phoenix faded away, replaced in spacetime with Technomage Phoenix, in her new EV-Suit that she'd developed just in case the first techno-gadgetry failed to keep her alive.

"Minor Lascerations Detected. Beginning Medical Diagnostic."

"Neural Toxin Detected. Antidote Administered."

The suit's onboard medical diagnostic system quickly patched the new Phoenix back together, just in time for her to crawl out of the sub's main gunner pod and into the water. Luckily for her, the suit included a helment, and was airtight. After all, anything designed for space worked underwater to some extent.

While she mentally reminded herself to get Flare back, as well as the plant-guy, and perhaps the hobbit too, Phoenix had to stay focused. Her real enemy was... Wait. Was that a MerDragQueen? Perhaps she'd been out longer than she'd origionally thought.

Seizing her closest-at hand, and most poetically fitting weapon, Phoenix swam toward the MerDragqueen, and attacked him with a curved, metallic weapon. Yes, so great was her anger that Phoenix opted not to use her plamsa rifle or other projectile weapon, for, in addition to possibly not working underwater, she felt the need to wade into melee. So, without further ado, a dark green clawed metallic form of a crowbar streaked toward the Merthing's face.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

For a moment Hawk was unable to move or respond to anything going on in the area, as he saw the results of his failed attack. He didn't know what had gone wrong and before he had a chance to work it out he found himself thrown backwards by a sudden current.

He slammed into the wall of the chamber, but fortunately his bubble held. It was still air that was trapped under a great volume of heavy liquid, so it wasn't going to simply vanish into nowhere, and his maintaining control over it was still strong.

He was dazed from the impact but no further attacks seemed to be forthcoming, so he used this sudden lapse to work out what had gone wrong. He examined the staff more closely and noticed the strange ring configurations upon it. Upon seeing this his knowledge of ancient weapons returned to him and he remembered more clearly what he knew of this weapon.

"Ahh of course, the rings determine its effects! This must be set to "sexy", so if I reverse this configuration..."

He quickly set to work, using the floor of the chamber to steady the weapon, he began revolving and twisting the rings using talons, beak, and remarkably, his wings, to carry out the work in double quick time.

Satisfied that the staffs new settings would bring about some more dramatic changes, Hawk began firing wildly in every direction, (the time for subtlety had passed, now was the time to blitz!) intentionaly aiming several shots at the Dark Merman(maid?), his harem, as well as taking a few pot-shots at Tarrin, Lumeas, Arhra, Flare and Syttulg, regardless of whether he was in a submarine or not, all for shits and giggles!

[Tarrin]

Tarrin saw the newly converted dark merman/maid charging at him the tridant pointed strait at his abdomin, raising his/her spirit lance he/she readied him/herself for the melee to come.

Just as the Dark maid was getting within range the now Technomagi smashed her across the head with what seemed to be a large crowbar, breathing a sigh of relief Tarrin took this quick break to retreave Arhra's rebreather and place it in her mouth, it was at this moment that wild shots begain streaking past him.

Looking around he saw Hawk blindly firing the staff that had feminised him, Grabing the unconscious Arhra he used her to sheald the incoming beams, feeling the impacts from two of the beams hit her he hoped she wouldn't wakeup and realise he had been involved.

Once the shots begain to move away from his area he looked around to find the Mermaid and plan her next strategy in operation: Kill the swimmy thing without dieing .

[mauve]

The little hearts floating above Mauve's head fizzled out of existance as the sexy mer-dude was replaced by a sexy mer-chick.

"Oh, he's gone. That's good," Mauve said, no longer under the spell of hawtness. "Now I can kill her for being prettier than me."

That was when she finally noticed the teensy little fact that A) the sub's prior beating had totaled most of the weapons and controls and B) One of the Dark Merman's henchwomen was currently inside the sub.

"Ooooorrr, I could find a way to get rid of the nymph," Mauve said slowly, backing away from the airlock. "That... That'd be good too."

[phil_]

OOC: I choose to go with Arhra's assesment that there is still a Nymph in the sub. This can work with Flare's meat-shield, as there were twelve harem girls in all. Heck, I can do one better and posit that the nymph she choked was climbing into the sub after the first nymph. Yes, I think that fixes that nicely.

And if I'm over-stepping my bounds too much in all that, someone yell at me.

Finally IC: Syttulg's mad jams, Mammoth's spirited defense, and Mauve's erratic piloting convened to grant Phil renewed lucidity. Kneeling down and putting a hand to his forehead, Phil moaned, "Dude, what came over me?" He looked up at MT. "Uh, dude, sorry about that. These sea women are kinda freaking me out, making me use words like 'lucidity' and reference single-word edits to my posts." Phil stood. "I'm sorry for my pitiful attack, and I hope you and your tank are cool with me."

Phil spun around to survey the surroundings. Through the copious windows, Phil could see that Lumaes and Tarrin were now lady-folk and the Merdude was now a Merchick. Skelington, Flare, and Syttulg were engaging the harem, Hawk had forgotten that there are times when firing indescriminately isn't the best option, Mauve was piloting the Frogsub, and a Nymph was choosing which person with her in the sub was the easiest target.

Wait.... "Oh snap!"

With his magic keeping the sub around and otherwise forgotten on his sign-up, Phil reached for the only weapon he had: the five-iron. Hoping to take the Nymph by surprise with a sudden attack, Phil swung at the back of her head. He missed by a mile. Target chosen, the Nymph whirled around and punched Phil hard in the gut. It wasn't petrifying, razor-sharp claws, but it knocked the wind out of him. With the strength given to her by her master, the Nymph quickly followed with a pointed kick to Phil's face, sending him flipping into his back with a small spurt of blood from his nose. Luckily, Phil still had some woozy, fading sense about him, and he managed to land without bashing the back of his head on the tilted deck.

In the moments before he could recover enough to move, Phil hurried through his options. Dismiss the sub, possibly drowning MT and Mauve, so that I can summon something else. Something explosive. Or, charge her again and get my ass handed to me again. Or, lay here and let her stomp on my face. Phil quickly decided that option three was out as the Nymph's foot crashed to the deck where his face had been a quick roll earlier.

Phil was now under one of the benches. Acting on instinct Phil snatched at the Nymph's foot, trying to drag her down. Or, he would have, if he hadn't been hit with a wave of intense desire to take her by the hand and have a picnic. Possibly an R-rated picnic. The Nymph, seeing his arm spasm, easily understood that he'd again fallen victim to her charms. Finally speaking, she cooed, "Come on out from there, my little pet. Let me hold you."

Phil swung his club and smacked her in both ankles, toppling her. As she fell, her face both dumbfounded and boiling with rage, Phil coughed, "Now MT! Do something!"

[Bailey]

OOC: Now with 25% more being attacked back!

IC: The harem had had a hard time noticing Syttulg due to his genderlessness for some reason, but you can only ignore somebody happily singing terrible pop music for so long, and so long is so short when said person is also trying to beat the crap out of you.

Somebody immune to their singing who was jamming them with a song of their own? Syttulg was definitely up there in priority. Two of them would deal with him while the others fought back against the crazy skeleton lady and the tentacle woman. They breathed a sigh of relief as the song ended, then shuddered in fear as Syttulg began singing along with the next song. "I feel pretty, oh so pretty," Syttulg was priority one. He had to die. NOW.

The entire remainder of the harem converged on Syttulg, intent on ripping him apart and using his carcass to decorate the room. Three of them reached him at once, and it was all Syttulg could do to release a weak electric blast before he was knocked over. Originally intended to just hit the siren in front of him, it hit everyone and everything anywhere close to nearby.

Syttulg stopped singing as the sirens pulled at his arm joints to dismember him, and that was around when he was struck with the crazy indiscriminate fire.

buffest lesbian hermaphrodite drag-queen chav this side of the pond

Syttulg began to change. Once more his muscles bulged unnaturally, but this time, there was no accompanying drop in intelligence. He easily wrenched himself free from the grasp of the sirens, and wheeled around to... kiss the nearest one?

Oh yeah, genderless swaps to hermaphrodite, and that meant he found himself charmed by both the sexy mer(wo)man and the alluring sirens.

Unlike the others who had been charmed by the mer(wo)man, he felt no rage towards the existing harem. He scanned the area, looking for threats to his new friends. There. If the others thought that that plant person was sexier, he might get kicked out!

He threw himself at Flare, blades at the ready.

[mammothtank]

"Now MT! Do something!" shouted a very distressed Phil. MT immediately reached for his sword, but the Nymph was already climbing back to her feet.
Crap, the sword's too slow! Improvise! Improvise! Wait, I suck at improv... but it's do or die this time, so here goes nothing! As the Nymph finished straightening up, MT leapt forward with a flying tackle that knocked her backward and onto the floor of the sub. Unfortunately, this put MT directly on top of her so that they were face to face, and the momentum of the tackle caused MT's already partially drawn sword to slide out of the sheath a little further, making standing up a difficult prospect due to the odd balance involved.
That is, if he had even thought of trying to get up. Instead, his cheeks turned a rosy pink as he watched the Nymph's scowl turn to a smirk. "Oh dear..." was all he could manage to say.

Exactly how much MT sucked at improv was now painfully clear.

[mauve]

The sub wasn't responding as well as Mauve had hoped. That meant that instead of charging towarads the mermaids with righteous fury, it was jerking spastically while floating upwards like a dying goldfish. The two frog-shaped torpedoes had been launched, but whether they had done any good was left to be seen. Or not seen, as the frog had kicked itself away from the merpeople.

Mauve was doing her part by cursing under her breath and kicking the control panel. It really didn't help. She had earlier abandoned the "Kill Nymph!" plan and reverted to "KICK MERMAN/MAID'S ARSE!!!" plan and went to the sub controls, but so far her efforts were all in vain. She was coming up with some very creative curses, though.

"Now MT! Do something!" Mauve's stream of obscenities was cut short by the distinct sound of a hobbit/summoner being attacked by a nymph. Mauve turned around in time to see MT slam the nymph into floor. That was good. And then his face turned bright pink. That was bad.

Time for Mauve Mage Super Rescue!!

There was a heroic, wise, and courageous way to defeat the nymph and save the day. A trick that was foolproof and effective. A plan that would rescue her friends and make short work of the evil nymph.

Mauve couldn't figure out what that plan could be, however, so she settled for kicking the nymph in the head while she was pinned down under the armor-clad MT.

The nymph's perfect features screwed up into a snarl of rage, and her gaze went from the blushing MT to the owner of the yellow leather boots that had been introduced to her skull. Mauve swallowed. She had kicked her pretty hard. Wasn't the nymph supposed to be unconscious or something now?

"Er..." the mage said uncomfortably. "Hi down there. You wanna, like, die or something? Cuz I've got stuff to do, and uh..." The nymph slowly pushed Mammothtank aside and rose to her feet. "Greeeeaaaat..."

The creature lunged at Mauve. The mage had just enough sense to lash out with her little knife as she stumbled backwards, and was rewarded with the satisfying feel of steel against flesh. A long, narrow gash appeared across the nymph's otherwise unmarred face. The nymph paused to touch her fingertips to the torn flesh. Mauve took advantage of the pause and threw a lightning bolt her way.

"What do you say to THAT, huh?" Mauve taunted, feeling pleased with herself. "Whatcha gonna do now that you've been sliced, kicked, and electrocuted, huh?"

The next thing Mauve knew, the sliced, kicked, electrocuted, and rather-put-out nymph was flinging her across the room. Mauve had the briefest sensation of being airborne, which was ended by the not-so-brief sensation of colliding with a bench.

"Oh. So THAT'S what you're gonna do. Interesting." she said, dizzily picking herself up off the ground. She struggled to regain her wits and began charging up another spell as soon as the little stars stopped dancing around her head.

The nymph stood in the center of the room, her eyes darting from Mauve to Phil to MT, deciding which one to take care of first.

[Arhra]

Unfortunately for Hawk, the mystical staff did not operate on easily understood principles. It was a mysterious staff of mystery. Even the instruction manual was a mystery unto itself. Mystery!

The Dark Merman had experienced fights with adventurers before and knew they were the type to smugly let themselves get hit by the staff's magic twice, confident that it would change them back to their original state. The Dark Merman detested them being so damn smarmy about it, so he'd found a solution. While the staff's default was a toggle setting, switching the gender of whatever it struck, the Dark Merman had taken the pains of learning how to make it only go one way. In his case, he'd set it to female only.

In any case, Hawk's changing of the ring-settings to what he believed was the reverse of the configuration had not removed the female-only bias. What he had done was modify the associated characteristics that could be inflicted. The previous settings could be summarised as Sexy, something the Dark Merman had reached through considerable study of the manual and experimentation.

What Hakw had sought was something to make his target less appealing, and in this he had been a failure. But a spectacular failure. He'd somehow managed to set it to More Sexy.

The Dark Mermaid had already been incredibly sexy. This was enough to kick her into some sort of previously only theorised state of hyper-sexiness. That it had been theorised showed some scientists have far too much time on their hands. She shimmered, a dark corona hiding her as the change took place. The waters seemed to be filled with ominous rumbling.

A moment later it was over. More beautiful than ever, waist just that touch thinner, curves just that little more pronounced, bronzed skin radiant, the eyes in that perfect face smouldering with allure. Sex appeal practically shone off her, making it impossible to tear the eyes away. She gave a coy smile. "I don't think your little hawk friend is very smart."

An imperious wave of her trident and the four harem girls still pawing over the submarine and not engaged in a swirling melee moved to attack Hawk. They were lovelier and more scantily clad than ever, begging the question of whether it was a matter of their clothes also being altered, or whether other physical changes were responsible.

In the case of Syttulg, the staff hadn't really been calibrated for genderless plants. In sheer confusion about what to do, the staff had resorted to making something along the lines of what Hawk had actually intended.

Arhra had chosen to wake up a split second before being grabbed by Tarrin and used as a human shield to block the bolts.

"GLAAAH?!" she had time to yell, before being speared by two magical bolts. She convulsed, feeling the vice grip of magic kneading her like putty, intense tingling through out her body. It wasn't too painful as magically forced transformations went actually, felt kind of warm... although there was something vaguely disturbing about it.

Thankfully, she managed to avoid stating what was happening to her in some sort of stilted monologue, just curling into a ball as rampant tingling rendered her unable to coordinate herself. Arhra felt her figure filling out, the lines of her form growing sleeker and more attractive and she knew on some metaphysical level, she was becoming sexier.

Tarrin knew he could be in trouble when Arhra turned to face him. But what he wasn't ready for was a sexier Arhra, looking both amorous and confused. "I must have you!" Arhra yelled, pouncing Tarrin and seeming ready to start tearing clothes off her victim.

"Bwhahahahaha! You should have seen the look on your face!" Arhra exclaimed a split second later, releasing her hold on a traumatised Tarrin. Well, she thought it was funny at least.

"Who are you anyway, woman who bears an uncanny resemblance to Tarrin?" Arhra thought about this sentence for a moment and then said, "Oh, right."

Arhra's gaze then swept about the room, seeing several similar things to what had happened to her occuring. It didn't take much to figure out what had passed. Her crimson gaze momentarily met eyes with Hawk. It boded, promising a future filled with plucking and stuffing. Thankfully, before it could kill, Arhra's red stare was drawn into sucking pull of the Dark Mermaid's allure.

She moved towards her seductive enemy. "So you're a girl now eh? And yet you still charm women. Does that mean we're supposed to have manner of all girl slumber party where we... oh... I don't know, compare breast sizes or something? And then there's some sort of orgy?" Arhra asked sarcastically. She had never been to one, but she had heard stories about that sort of thing.

The Dark Mermaid looked puzzled. "Actually, I've never heard of that one. I'll have to remember it..." she trailed off introspectively. "Wait, aren't you supposed to be comatose?"

"There's only one thing I'm supposed to be and no coma's going to stop me. ...Wait... Two things! That second thing is kicking your perfectly formed ass! uh... Tail!" Arhra wished she'd had more time to think that line through.

"Brave words. I like that. You're even prettier now too. How about you join my harem?" When Arhra's face said quite clearly what she though of the offer, the Dark Mermaid's expression turned scornful. "Come now, its not like you have any choice in the matter."

She struck a seductive pose, a vortex of dark energy almost visible about her. It was threatening to pull the NPFers nearby in and entrap them in sensuous enchantment. Arhra felt the waves of that dark tide sweep over her, trying to summon all her hatred as she fought its pull.

OOC: Oh, for ease of reference let's say everyone outside was in danger of getting hit. Given the number of potshots Hawk took, I'd say people inside the sub are in danger of getting hit too, if they feel like it (through a window).

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

"God damn shitty piece of ancient shitty technomagi crap!!" Hawk yelled in anger at the weapon, while giving it a vigourous shake in a feeble attempt to make it work. "Who in the hell would build a weapon of such a poor and contrived overly-complicated nature?!"

All of this time he had been staring at the weapon (the last time he had looked up he had seen Arhra staring at him with murderous intent and so had kept his head down), and it was only now that his gaze left the staff and saw four more, even sexier, harem girls swimming towards him, also with murderous intent in their eyes.

For a moment Hawk almost lost his composure, but he had already lost his mind once today and he was damned if he was going to let himself be controlled again!

Hawk had to think quickly. He had two options:

1) Randomly alter the ring configuration for a third time and hope that it turned into a matter of the third time being the charm, or;

2) Snap the staff right now and hope that it would somehow undo everything that had been wrought with its power, like the One Ring.

Decisions decisions...

Hawk decided. He could always snap it later, if there was a later, and it was always better to try and aquire new weapons in war. If only he had the time to figure out the meaning of the rings, to study the weapon, perhaps purose some ancient texts on the subject and experiment with it some more. He had none of the above and so randomly spun all of the intricate rings with a swift swipe of his wing, aimed it at the oncoming harem and opened fire, all the while moving backwards towards the wall of the chamber.

At the least, the transformations would buy him the time to temporarily flee and come up with a new plan. At the best, they would become hulking, ugly, fat, immovable trolls with zero sex appeal and no self esteem or willingness or ability to fight back, but Hawk sensed that was wishful thinking.

[PhoenixFlame]

"God damn shitty piece of ancient shitty technomagi crap!!"

During her frenzied, unthinking crowbar assault on the Dark Mermaid, which managed to save Tarrin from an untimely demise, Phoenix was suddenly and inexplicably peppered with a rain of wildly-fired staff-bolts. The weird staggering effect was supplemented by nausa and accompanied by a very sickening feeling inside, but even as her now much sexier EV-Suit began to rattle off a damage report, Phoenix responded to this most grievous assault on her livelihood.

"Hey, I didn't build that thing! Watch who you insult!" Phoenix yelled, feeling a distinct, unavoidable wish to draw a small handheld firearm and empty it's clip in Hawk's direction in much the same fashion he had just done to her. This however, was restricted by the fact that firearms preformed very poorly underwater.

"Warning: Major Bodily Reconstruction Detected." her suit's onboard computer meekly reported. Phoenix was unpretrubed. No, she had a Dark Mermaid to glomp. Glomp with love and huggles and angry vengeance, in much the same style as a magical girl anime.

If only that shapely, succubi-emulating mer-woman would just pay attention to her! How rude! After all, if one were attempting to seduce Phoenix, they could at least LOOK at her when trying to do it. Yet, not wanting to appear rude, Phoenix slowly swam up to the Merwoman, now engaged in a strange combination of villanous monologue and feminine banter with Arhra, and swung her crowbar at it's head. Phoenix had always been very direct when someone was being rude!

[mammothtank]

OOC:Given the number of potshots Hawk took, I'd say people inside the sub are in danger of getting hit too, if they feel like it (through a window).Given both this statement and the fact that I neglected to properly equip my character when I popped back in (and that he took a few more shots just now), the opportunity is too perfect to pass up.

MT sat up slowly, still dazed from his, um, encounter with the Nymph. As he did so, his sword slid back into its sheath. He also tried standing up slowly, but with a hard look from the Nymph, he settled for merely sitting up. He shook his head to clear it.

A second later, the Nymph, for some odd reason, quickly turned around and looked out the window. Seeing such an easy opportunity, MT jumped to his feet, drew his sword, swung it, and connected with empty air - his target had suddenly dropped to a crouch for some odd reason that was probably on the same vein as the previous one. In an instant, he knew the reason: an odd beam of light was headed straight for the sub - straight for the window. Before MT had time to react (all he managed was "What the f-"), the beam nailed him square in the torso. The transformation took about a second, and within five more, MT realized what had happened.

"As soon as I find whoever just did that, he or she or it is going to become very familiar with the business end of my blade," MT declared, sporting a very sinister expression. She gripped her sword with both hands as though to illustrate the point, which ended up looking much like a ready stance. The Nymph straightened up, curious enough to try to get a better look.

[phil_]

OOC: Permissions were asked and granted from MT and Mauve.

IC: Things had changed considerably in the last minute, so Phil took advantage of the Nymph's interest in MT to come up with a plan.

He started with a mental diagram that looked something like this.
http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/1188/frogdiagrammw2.png
In reality, there was a bit more elbow room, a couple inches of water, and the weapons stations were broken, but it serves to chart where the sub's current occupants are.

Ok, gotta think. She's fast and agile and she charms me whenever I have a chance to think with her swaying hair and voice like light rippling through the waves DAMMIT! ...I gotta be fast, both so she can't dodge and so I can't get caught in her charms. Second problem with attack number one: I need some magic behind my doughy hobbit muscle. Too bad all my magic's held up on summoning this sub! I swear, if I get knocked out, I'm asking Arhra if I can get my low-level black magic back. Anyway, I need magic and speed...

Phil looked at Mammothtank. "You know," he purred, "you make that armor look damn fine with your new curves." Before Mammoth could get out a "tha Hell?!" Phil had him I MEAN "HER!" locked in a passionate embrace, his back to the Nymph. Faces together, Phil whispered, "Dude, I have a plan. Listen, you have to hit me at the Nymph with a Bowling Bash. It'll work. I can't explain anymore, 'cause I know it's obvious to that Nymph that I couldn't possibly kiss someone for much longer. Just hit me when I jump back."

"Just so long as you don't kiss me."

"I think I'd deserve one for what I'm asking you to do to me," was Phil's reply.

Phil hopped back, whipped out his five-iron, and yelled "Mauve!" Spinning to face his target, he now yelled, "Golf club!" as MT's attack smashed into his back. Flying through the air, Phil yelled "Lightning!" And, just as he was about to pass the Nymph as she dodged the hurtling hobbit, he yelled "Now!"

Somehow, Mauve understood this to mean, "Mauve Mage, if you would so kindly blast my magic golf club with a Lightning spell, I can go all Chrono on this unkind woman." So, as Phil screamed "Now!" Mauve's spell was already in route to his swinging club. As the electrical magic collided with the club, sending glowing fangs streaming behind it's arc, Phil screamed what he thought was a really cool attack name, but was probably just overcomplicated.

"Triple Tech! Eagle Éclair Strike!" Phil bashed the electrified club squarely arcoss the Nymph's back. He then flew past and into the control panel, smashing it to pieces. Considering his previous scuffle with the Nymph, MT's attack, the imperfect channeling of Mauve's spell through his barely-magical weapon, and his final impact with the ship, it looked like Phil would get his wish for a coma fantasy. But, considering his speed, the cramped quarters they were fighting in, and the overall strangeness of the attack, it was doubtful that the Nymph could dodge completely, if at all, so maybe it was worth it.

OOC: But I'll leave that, to you, Arhra.

[Arhra]

Hawk was attempting a different configuration of the staff's rings, hoping to use it against the four sirens swimming towards him. However, the staff hadn't been designed for sustained fire and he'd already overstrained it. Instead of releasing more bolts of transformative energy as Hawk tried to use it again, it rumbled ominously, giving a high pitched whine and then magic surged off it. The staff jolted out of Hawk's claws, an arc of energy leaping from the tip to strike Hawk in the chest.

It had a most unexpected effect. The staff's mysterious, malfunctioning powers transformed him into a peacock. Well, technically, a peafowl. That is, the species as a whole are called peafowl. 'Peacock' is only correctly applied to the males of the species. Not that Hawk was transformed into a peacock. Oh no. She was now a peahen.

The sirens gave tinkling peals of laughter, watching as the staff sunk to the bottom of the room, still glowing with energy and emitting a faint whine. A rusalka swam ahead of the others, eyes dancing with green flames. "Now you are ours, little creature." she murmured to the bird, plunging a hand limned with phosperent green light through Hawk's air bubble and popping it like a dream. The other three, a nymph and two mermaids, closed in.

* * *

Hearing Phil yell his attack's name, the Nymph pasuedly briefly in confusion. "Wait... Éclair?" she started to say, but that had been all the opening Phil needed. He whalloped her on the back of the head with an electrified golf club. Her eyes rolled up in her head and then she collapsed, smoking slightly. She spasmed slightly, from the current discharged into her, as she lay sprawled on the ground. Phil's gambit had definately paid off. Flying hobbits weilding the combined fury of the storm and golf were not to be trifled with.

Meanwhile, Hydra had managed to find her way to a gunner's seat. "Are these still working?" she hissed to herself, fiddling around to try and aim. Her eyes where then drawn to where the Dark Mermaid battled the NPFers. "Ooooo, pretty." she said to herself, captivated by the sight.

* * *

Arhra shot Phoenix a thumbs up as the technomagus swiftly swam up behind the Dark Mermaid that Arhra's banter seemed to have successfully distracted and clubbed on her on the head with a crowbar. While the deadliness of such weapons when wielded by engineer/scientist types trying to save the world is well documented, it wasn't enough to lay the Dark Mermaid out for the count. She looked furious and rattled.

Arhra knew to snatch victory, they'd have to assault the Dark Mermaid in as many ways as possible - physically, psychologically, spiritually, verbally, wittily, laterally! Still, it wasn't looking good as she tried to swim at the Dark Mermaid, her face turning dreamy as she entered the barely glimpsed dark vortex about her foe. The Dark Mermaid watched with a (slightly dazed) predatory smile, jetting forwards to momentarily elude Phoenix's reach.

"Wow, those clothes you're wearing are really nice." Arhra said, syrup in her voice. Really, it was more one piece of clothes. The Dark Mermiad was hardly overdressed. "Where did you find it? Although," Arhra lowered her voice to a confidential tone as she approached, "I'm worried they might make me look like a... DUMB SLUT!" She yelled, punching the Dark Mermaid in the boob and then slamming into her.

"Ooof!" the Dark Mermaid exclaimed, despite it being impossible to have the wind knocked out of her underwater. Swishing back a few feet, trying to kepe an eye on Phoenix, her expression turned devillish. "Oh yes, go on, body-slam me with that voluptous body of yours."

Arhra paused in confusion. The Dark Merman had never acted like some kind of masochist. Why would the Dark Mermaid want Arhra to collide with her well endowed frame, their silkily smooth skin caressing... "I'm on to you!" Arhra shouted.

The Dark Mermaid pouted sensuously. "You're no fun. Let's see if your friend is any better." She swung her trident, Arhra suddenly finding herself have to struggle against a wall of water seeking to push her away while the Dark Mermaid turned and swam for Phoenix.

[Bailey]

Syttulg was incredibly confused.

First he had been inside the sub and then mysteriously teleported outside without remembering how, sealing the door up behind him all the while, and now Flare had ceased to be outside or a plantfolk just as he had been pouncing at her.


On what could be called the upside, he was currently a very sexy muscular hermaphrodite.

Maybe he could use that somehow.

Ah, there was the Dark Mer(wo)man over there.



Transforming his arms into an array of tentacles, (everybody knows that tentacles are more effective underwater!) Syttulg propelled himself through the water and attacked the Mer(wo)man, only to find his vision promptly blurry as the Nintendo Censorship Angel finally showed up to make sure that this fight remained wholesome.



Apparently, the censorship angel felt that hermaphroditic creatures with tentacles attacking sexy females needed to be blurred out.

[PhoenixFlame]

"Hey! Get... Back here!" Phoenix growled through her helment's speakerphone into the water after the mermaid, which somehow had been facilitating the speech of all parties thusfar, air-breathing or not. Her tag-team match with Arhra had been going... Fair, thusfar. Yet alone, the two shapely females would have great difficulty defeating the seductive daemon-fish.

Pursuit had given way to failure, as even a mermaid is faster than a scientist in an enviromental suit. As the mermaid turned around to face her, and attempt to draw Phoenix into her embrace, the technomage switched to thermal imaging to attempt to at least slow down any attempts at magical seduction. Then, drawing on the typical plot-holeesque manner in which characters can carry ridiculously large arsenals without being encumbered, she tapped the "three" key on her nonexistant keyboard, and drew a long, chrome weap... Wait, was that a .357 magnum?!

Of course, underwater, firearms didn't function very well. No matter... As this close range, range was rather irrelevant.

"You're no fun. Let's see if your friend is any better."

"Hey there, hot stuff..." Phoenix grinned in a sultry manner to the large red heat-signature blob, shaped like a mermaid in the center of her IR-Scanner. "How about I give you a kiss? Or... How about a kiss from this?" She grins big, raising her pistol and gently depressing the trigger. Being seduced in the middle of combat after being hyped up and then medicated for combat drugs and toxins, well... It didn't take much to translate "A little love" as in, physical love to that of "A little love" as in, weapons love.

As the hammer popped back, she had second thoughts as the gentle, seductive pulsing of the heat signature began to set in motion a primal urge seated in the rear of her skull, but it was too late. Once a revolver is set in motion, it remains in motion, until a force acts on it.

Wait, that wasn't a law of physics, was it? *KBOOM!*

Bubbles erupted from the area around her weapon's cylinder as a lethal lead projectile drilled through the ocean toward it's fishy prey.

[Tarrin]

Tarrin had only now overcome the horror that was Arhra's joke of coming onto him.....
Visions of terror and the end of life as he knew it had flashed thru his head, the long nights, darkly romantic dinners and the heavy chains..

Shaking her head he refocused to see Arhra and phoenix attacking the Dark mermaid, taking this as her que she entered the fray ripping her lance at the mer's unprotected back, the mermaid was ready for the attack however and dodged to the left leaving Tarrins swing flailing wide into the water.

A smile crossed the Dark mermaids face and she held up a finger wiggeling it from side to side "Tisk Tisk... Didn't your daddy teach you that ladies dont fight" The smile started to weakin Tarrins rage over her gender change,

Looking the Mermaid up and down there were aspects that reminded her of the list that his standards had been set to. No how could he have any hope with his list if he was a girl, Anger rose once again to the surface and just before she launched another attack a strange thought crossed into her mind "I wonder if the mermaid had legs would she have an ass like Jessica Alba??'

[mauve]

"You know, I never thought I'd have the opportunity to electrocute an airborne, golf club-weilding summoner hobbit being hurled towards a siren," Mauve said to herself. "This job has so many perks."

But she didn't have time to ponder over this. They were in a damaged submarine with an unconscious hobbit, a possibly-dead nymph, a deranged Hydra, and a female MT. And then outside, they had an army of nymphs, the homicidal maniacs known collectively as Mauve's Supposed Allies, and the Dark Mermaid, whose fiendish powers turned could instantly transform her into an object of gorgeousness if she so much as looked out the window.

"Hmmmm," Mauve said, seriously contemplating that last bit. "Nah. Too much trouble in the long run."

Her mind made up, Mauve reverted to Plan Kick Mermaid's Ass. She wasn't quite sure what this plan might involve yet, but she was fairly certain it would end up being very violent. And Mauve liked that thought.

"All right, time to go," Mauve said. "Let me just scrape the Phil off the control panel and we'll find a way to serve the Mermaid a helping of JUSTICE. Justice and maiming. But mostly maiming, if I have my way."

[Steel Shadow]

The world began to swim into focus. That was fairly concerning, since Steel couldn't remeber how it had swum out of focus in the first place. In fact, there seemed to be a major blank spot in his memory, starting from the end of the battle with the leauge of enemys, and ending right now. Where the hell was he?

Steel blinked and tried to raise his head, taking in his surroundings. He was in a metal box, aparently. He could see water through the windows, so it made sense that this was a submarine. He winced as the effort of moving his head increased his headache. One question answered. Now, why was he here? Then he caught sight of a few of his fellow NPF'ers. Oh hell. Not just a nightmare then. So, that meant he was probably in the middle of some hectic battle and doom was iminent. Better get up.

The world stopped spinning as he got to his feet. His memory was still a little blurry, which was annoying. He would have liked to know how he'd ended up unconsious in a submarine, why there was a very painful lump on the back of his head, and how his cape, which hade been reduced to little more than a few loose threads when he'd left the earth temple, was suddenly as good a new. But, alas, he had no time to solve these mysterys now. No no, now was a time for killing things, not asking questions. That would come later.

He looked around, finaly getting a clear view of the sub. Dead nymph. Great. Unconsious hobbit. Ooookay. Sexy looking yet strangly familiar armoured chick with sword. Knowing his luck, if he so much as spoke to her that sword would end up lodged in his spine, he thought as he slowly edged away from her. Pissed off mage heading for what looked suspiciously like the main controls. Oh dear. Did this thing have seat belts?

[Flarecobra]

Taking advantage of the momentary distraction provided by the blast of loud music, and the fact that I needed t obreathe, I decided to go plantgirl, since it wasn't nessessary to have air avalable for that form. Just as soon as I finished my change, I was tackled by two more nymphs, knocking my off and landing behind the sub. One of them made off with my gear, while the other followed me. We started to grapple with each other, myself with a bit of an edge as I had some leverage, but she had me in speed.

I tired to see if I could use any of my magic abilities, and then found out something rather bad. I couldn't use it. "Crap." I said, just as the Nymph was hit by a Sexy-bolt, causing her hair to grow a little longer, hips a bit wider, and chest...well, she was already a bit top-heavy, now she was quite top-heavy. She then did the last thing I was expecting. She swam in, and tacklehugged me, planting a full-on, deep kiss on my lips. <Ok...perhaps this isn't too bad...what the hell am I thinking!? I've already got a girlfriend! Granted she might like her...hell, they've got similor eye color....and she does know how to touch the ri....Stop it!> I thought, as I started to succumb to the nymph's powers, as she started to rub all over my body....

[THE REST OF THIS POST HAS BEEN CENSORED DUE TO ADULT CONTENT]

[mammothtank]

MT grabbed a lock of her now long hair and stared at it. "Of all the days to forget my Trueform Pin...! This is reversible, right?" She sighed, then added, "And geez, this armor really wasn't built for a female figure. Maybe if I..." Now matter how she tried adjusting it, the armor refused to fit well, so she gave up and unequipped it, leaving her with just the oil-stained camo shirt from before. She sat down and sighed again. "Maybe I can borrow something from Flare..." MT suddenly stood up again. "Hey, I can! Where is she?" Turning 180°, MT looked up and around into the water, finally spotting a green plant-ish humanoid grappling with a Nymph. "Is that... no, that's her, but she's fighting... no, not... but... and... and..." Turning another 180, she finished the sentence. "...and I think I need a new plan..."

[Arhra]

"I wonder if the mermaid had legs would she have an ass like Jessica Alba??" Tarrin mused, unaware she'd spoken her thought aloud.

"You're not so bad yourself," the voice came huskily from behind, accompanied by the distinct sensation of a hand on the topic of interest. Tarrin's eyes were suddenly wide open and fixed rigidly forwards, not willing to look back and confirm the speaker's identity.

It was obvious to any onlookers, Arhra's head appearing from behind Tarrin's craning forwards over her right shoulder to whisper into her ear. Her red eyes were half lidded, closed in drowsy pleasure. "Cheating on me already? I'm so very dissapointed." A pale hand clasped onto Tarrin's shoulder, gently but inexorably forcing her to turn around. It was like trying to escape the cold metal jaws of a bear trap.

Arhra's face was a fallen angel's, the strands of her short hair floating in the water giving her a dark halo. Though her wicked grin was hidden by the mask-like rebreather covering her lower face, it was plainly evident in the gleam of her eyes. "You'll have to make it up to me... later." she purred, eyes sliding past to fix on the Dark Mermaid. "But, for now, you'd best get back in the fray!" Whirling around, she tossed Tarrin at the Dark Mermaid.

Arhra resisted the urge to laugh. She had been caught struggling with uncoperative tides at the fringes of the fight. Having seen Tarrin succumbing to the Dark Mermaid's sinister charms, Arhra decided to intervene. What better cure for such infatuation could there be than stark, raving terror? A mind full of existential horror had room for nothing else.

But, looking at the situation, Arhra wasn't quite sure what to do next. Phoenix, Newb and Tarrin were fighting the Dark Mermaid and looking quite hard pressed but she could see Hawk (Peahen) being assaulted by a number of sirens and drowning. Higher on her List of People She Might Help was Lumaes in a scratching, hair-pulling, massive brawl with most of the Dark Mermaid's harem while Flare was otherwise... engaged with one of the enemy.

Fight a sexy mermaid (with the distinct possibility of stealing said sexy powers) or help the Skull? If only she could be in three places at the same time!

Arhra made her choice. As the indomitable Madame Lume exchanged blows with a tenacious mermaid, Arhra suddenly swam up from behind, wrapping her arms around the mermaid's to pin her, merrily beginning some energy siphoning at the same time. She shot a look at Lumaes, the ancient message of "I hold, you punch."

Things were chaotic, the beguiling melodies of the sirens competing with the blare of loud music, their cadence thrown off by the swirling brawl most of them were engaged in. Even the crack of Phoenix's gun shot barely carried over it.

The Dark Mermaid jerked, a tiny plume of blood where she was hit. She gasped, free hand clasping over the wound. "You shot me!" she exclaimed in mixed pain and rage, surprisingly not following up with the standard "You shot me right in the [insert body part]."

Even in a blind rage, she was breathtaking, the wound not really seeming to slow her down as she raised her trident. It suddenly coursed with azure flame along its length, and, with a cry of fury, the Dark Mermaid hurled it at Phoenix.

OOC: As you've probably noticed, one of Arhra's favourite hobbies is screwing with people's minds. In the interests of clear chronology, Tarrin was thrown at the Dark Merman after she was shot, but before she hurled her spear at Phoenix, leaving open a window for interference.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

Upon the destruction of Hawks bubble, the compressed air exploded outwards, engulfing Hawk, the nearby rusalka, the nymph and the two mermaids. A shockwave of sound came with it, a great boom of chaos, and then the swirling vortex rushed skywards towards the ceiling of the chamber, pulling all with it.

The fate of Hawk remained unknown.

[Tarrin]

Visions assaulted Tarrins mind as he flew through the water, Arhra in skimpy clothing, Arhra on a gondala in Venace, Arhra bathing in a bubble bath of pink foam, a Trident, Arhra.....Wait a Trident?

Shaking his head a little Tarrin saw the flaming trident hurtling towards Phoenix, but to get to her it had to get past Tarrin first, but how to do it? that was the question.

Would he use his lance to deflect it?, Would he kick or punch at the weapon?, or would he phone a friend?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

The phones ring echoed thru the opulant mansion, footsteps on the marble floor announced the hurried steps of the owner of the phone.

"Hello Doctor Phill speaking.......Oh Tarrin how are you....uhu.....hmmm...yes...yes....oh that's easy"

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tarrin nodded as Dr Phill answered his question a smile came to his face,
Thanks Doc" and with that he shot out her hand grabing the haft of the Trident firmly, her momentum slowed and when he stopped she was holding both his lance and the mermaids weapon, Puoring his power into the Trident it once again flamed with it's unholy power.

Oh now it's fun time, the smile that came over Tarrin was one of pure unadolerated hatered and fear let's not forget that, Charging at the mermaid Tarrin swung both Trident and lance at the fish, A cloud of bubbles erupted from around the two combatents in a typical Manga clifhanging break.


As the cloud cleared the scene was revealed in all its glory, The mermaid had blocked the trident with one of her forearms allowing the points to bite deep within the flesh, her other hand had shot out the sharp well manicured nails pearcing Tarrins chest, it was the lanc however that had done the real job however as it had run thru the mer's body, coughing out blood Tarrin gave the Lance a twist and a look of both shock and horror crossed the mermaids face.

Once again a smile crossed Tarrins face as he coughed up more blood, he then went limp and started to slowly drift upwards all sighns of movement gone only a blood trail from the gaping chest wound showing the path of his drift.
(OOC: Up to you Arhra as to how much damage the spirirt lance did to him)

[PhoenixFlame]

Phoenix's eyes widened as a doomtrident of pain was aimed in her general direction with a distinct azure energy flare. Now, in common roleplaying mechanics, a distinctive energy flare obviously meant the attack would do several magnitudes more damage than an attack sans said flare. The scale went something like the spectrum of visible light. Red flares were typically weak, with green being slightly more powerful, leading up to blue(azure) and finally violet.

So to be attacked with azure was a threat to one's very life, and it was very fortunate that Tarrina was so kind to save Phoenix from what would invariably be a painful wound.

Allowing her to strike back! Though unfortunately, none of Phoenix's violet attacks worked underwater. Violet, after all, was not waterproof.

Kicking forward with her legs at the beleagured Mermaid, Phoenix opened fire with her pistol, once or twice, mainly just to distract the Mermaid into attempting to dodge or divert her attention from the incoming Phoenix. In addition to Tarrina's assault, this worked quite well. So, as she approached, the technomancer managed to administer a powerful left-hook with her crowbar, now in her left hand. No pun intended, of course.

[mauve]

"Hmm," Mauve said, prodding the unconscious Phil with the toe of her boot. "I wonder how long summoned things stick around if their summoner is out cold?"

She decided that the best thing to do at this point would be to find a way to breathe in water should the sub dissappear all of the sudden. Knowing Mauve's luck, such an occurance was highly probable. Best be prepared. Oxygen first, and horrible, violent revenge on certain Merfolk second. Mauve had her priorities.

So now where was she going to get--

"Here," Mauve said cheerfully, suddenly holding a scuba mask and an air tank. "There just so happen to be four sets. Rather fortunate, don't you guys think?"

Wait, wait, wait! Where the hell did she get those?

"I found them," Mauve explained. "They were.. um.. under the benches?"

Wow. Mauve must really be desperate to write some garbage like this. Finding scuba gear just laying around? Could we be any less creative?

"Probably not," Mauve admitted. "But none of my other ideas were working for me."

Well, aside from breaking down the fourth wall and coming up with the lamest plan for breathing underwater EVER in the history of NPF Roleplaying, they at least had a way to... well... breathe underwater.

So now priority one was taken care of, so it was time for a little of priority two. Mauve had just the thing. She pulled a crayon out of her pocket and started scribbling odd notes and equasions on the floor, working out a new spell for herself. Let's see now... Something flashy, like Rocket Flare, but not overly showy. And with that special Mauve Mage touch...

Bingo. She put the final touches into her equasion, making sure the reasoning was sound. Meh, close enough. She skipped over to the window, humming to herself. Let's see if it works.

"TORPEDO FLARE!!" yelled Mauve, pointing at the Mermaid. An army of brightly-colored, cartoony, miniature torpedoes popped into existance just outside the sub. After locking onto their target, they shot forwards into the water, leaving a trail of bubbles in their wake. It was like Squaresoft and Disney meet "Hunt for Red October."

"Sweet," Mauve chuckled. "Donald Duck ain't got nothin' on me."

They'd PROBABLY all hit the Mermaid and avoid the NPFers around her, but you never know. Oh well. It was a risk Mauve was willing to take. For the good of all, you know. And one stray magic torpedo wouldn't KILL anyone. Probably. Possibly. Most likely. In theory.

Oh well.

[phil_]

Phil fumbled for the alarm until he realised that no alarm was going off. Opening his eyes, he found himself in his nice, black bed in his little apartment. Then he noticed the impenetrable darkness that swallowed everything five feet from himself, and realised that he wasn't awake. Phil stepped out of bed and found himself suddenly at the helm of a giant mech. A giant, Phil-shaped mech. The two plowed through a jungle in the dark, no noise coming from the phantom trees and vines that Phil was aware of in the way one can be aware of things only in dreams. Suddenly, they came upon a giant, furry, wolf-y, spidery thing clutching a soccer ball on the same scale as the monster and the Philbot.

"You know, Phil," the creature said, "They were all really expecting more from you."

"Yeah, maybe I can jazz it up if someone asks what happened. Say, can I have my black magic back, Arhra?"

"We'll see," said the fuzzy monster.

Phil shuddered back to life in the sub. "I still got one hit point, I'm ready for action," Phil drooled. Wobbling to his feet, Phil slurred, "Kay, you guys have until the world is less flashing and painful to figure out how to breathe waters. Then the sub is gone. 'Cept I'm not that ruthless, so take your time."

Phil had been wobbling through the sub while saying this. Maybe he'll throw up. What fun this day has been!

[Bailey]

Seeing the various attacks coming, and finding him/her-self in the way of all the attacks, Syttulg panicked and jetted away (a well-known property of tentacles is allowing people to jet around underwater, like a squid or an octopus) from the mer(wo)man before the spirit lance, trident, crowbar, and torpedo flare could accidentally hit him/her. Once s/he was confident that it was safe, Syttulg jetted back towards the sexy seabeast and attempted to grasp her limbs and hold her splayed to make her an easier target, much like Arhra was doing to help Lumaes.

[Arhra]

The Dark Mermaid was not having a good day. Coincidences like this simply shouldn't happen. She'd been the first person to come to this benighted temple in thousands of years and, mere weeks later, the NPFer's had arrived. At least Krylo hadn't been there. But still, this fight really wasn't going well. The merman had been made into a mermaid by the power of his own staff, although she had to admit it had certain assets. It wasn't as if he hadn't tried it before, though pronouns were a real pain.

Speaking of real pain, the Dark Mermaid was not feeling at her best. She had been insulted, punched, shot and crowbared, and the worst was yet to come.

In rage, the Dark Mermaid had hurled her deadly trident, only to have it snatched mid-flight by Tarrin. Seeing the charge, the Dark Mermaid could see the hatred and fear in the spirit channeler's eyes, knowing her enemy was, for the moment, beyond the reach of her enchantments.

She brought up one slender arm up to block the trident, sliding between the razor-tipped prongs, halting the weapon's advance but she could do nothing about the spiritual lance, the mystical weapon piercing through her, Tarrin then twisting it in the wound. She gasped, her other hand shot out, to land a crippling blow on Tarrin in an alarming display of physical prowess.

As Tarrin's limp body began to drift up towards the roof, the Dark Mermaid, grabbing hold of her trident once more, was forced to dodge a bullet. An angry technomage was close behind. Slowed by injury, she was not quite able to block Phoenix's crowbar, trident interposed to feebly knock it aside. A numbing hit on her upper arm, she gave a burst of speed to distance herself again.

She found herself under attack be strange, minitature torpedos, exploding in bright, cheery firework-like bursts about her. The Dark Mermaid gave one more desperate burst of speed, glancing back to see what pursued her, and promptly ran into a frog-torpedo that had been fired and forgotten some time ago, though still kicking weakly.

"What's one more torpedo?" people might ask. To summarise briefly:

Magical micro-torpedos - small boom.

Frog shaped big torpedo - big boom.

What can be said about the explosion that hasn't been said before? The NPFer's had been around a lot after all, so one could call them explosion connoisseurs. And, of course, underwater explosions were often a lot less flashier than your regular kind. Largely becuase its hard to set things on fire underwater. This one was certainly a spirited attempt at it however. The Dark Mermaid became a silhouette in the searing brightness, even just her shadowy profile managing to tug at the strings of desire, before being obscured by brightness and clouds of bubbles.

And then it was gone. The Dark Mermaid had vanished completely, all that remained a thin, dark miasma floating in the water. Almost unnoticed, a booklet sunk gently to the floor. It was labeled, in what was almost gibberish, "Instrukion For Make Use Upside-Down Sex Rod". Mystery!

Arhra suspected the Dark Mermaid's apparent vapourisation was because a exploded corpse was not even remotely attractive. There was a great wailing and a nashing of teeth from the harem as the Dark Mermaid died. Arhra took the opportunity to slip out of the grasp of the rusalka who had been strangling her from behind and, seeing the creature seemed quite dazed, capitalised on it further.

BIFF! BAM! SOCKO!

While loose ends were still all over the place, it seemed the battle was effectively over. Now sir, a war is won.

OOC: Apologies for delays. I wanted to get this done yesterday, but just couldn't write anything. Some events were slightly fiddled with, like the trident block.

[mammothtank]

Suiting herself up in some scuba gear, MT briefly saw her shadow on the wall of the sub. Whirling around, she got a glimpse of an explosion out in the water that quickly faded. She scanned the water for a moment and realized that the Dark Merman (well, mermaid was more accurate, but whatever) was suddenly no longer accounted for. On a hunch, she looked up - sure enough, "MVP" written in large letters was visible above the sub for only a moment before it vanished.

MT raised an eyebrow, then sighed. "ANYway, if the baddie's finally soggy toast, that means we can regroup and move on, right? It feels like we've been down here for a week, and I wanna get back onto dry land." She shuddered. "I still don't like submarines..."

[phil_]

Phil had retired from wobbling aimlessly around the sub and was now leaning against the wall. He had heard the victory fanfare, so he knew that whatever it was that had happened was over now. He could also feel his few spells returning to him, perhaps from the blow to his head, or maybe as magical backlash from the Tri Tech. He wasn't sure if everyone in the sub had prepared for when he'd have to dismiss it, but Mauve had found some scuba gear, so that would probably sort itself out. Yep, everything was pretty ok for the moment as long as Phil ignored that he was holding onto conciousness by one hitpoint.

Lazily pushing himself off the wall (because Phil can't say anything without saying what he did immediately before), Phil sighed, "Welp, 'bout time I did something about that." Walking to the sparking and possibly burning control panel, Phil said ove his shoulder, "You guys listen to this too," either addressing the folks in the sub or perhaps his shoulder angels. Phil picked up the microphone and said through the sub's external speakers, "Alright, that guy is dead. Yatta. Now, let's see if we can get that seaweed off the remaining door, as this sucker ain't smashing another wall." Phil gave the controls a twirl to illustrate his point. "Also, if anyone can heal or has a potion, I could really use it. I'm about a mosquito bite away from going to Candyland again for a while." Phil started to put down the microphone, then picked it up again to add, "And someone try to find the emergency food supply."

Satisfied that he'd put everyone on track for continuing their quest by reminding them of the other door from six pages ago, Phil put down the microphone and henshined into his spacesuit. Hopefully, if someone outside's gonna heal me, they'll tap on the windows or something. Heh, who am I kidding? White magic, here? They'll probably try to burn down the seaweed or something instead.

[mauve]

Mauve was doing a victory dance, or something resembling a victory dance, over by the window.

"Oh yeaaaah, uh-huuuuh, torpedooooes, kick aaaass!!" she sang to herself. She didn't care that everyone else had beaten the crap out of the mermaid long before her torpedo attack hit her; the fact that the torpedoes actually worked mattered most to Mauve. Torpedoes and chainsaws, all in the same RP? Rock on.

Now, seeing that Phil looked ready to pass out again, Mauve remembered that Skyshot was gone, leaving her as the resident magical healer. (Skyshot still had her hat, dammit!!! Mauve wanted it back!!) She ceased the victory dancing and did a mental scan of her magic reserves. The Torpedo Flare had taken up a surprising amount of MP, but she still had enough to go about her duties as stand-in medical professional.

"Cura!" she commanded, waving a hand in Phil's direction. "Come on, Phil. Only one coma-dream sequence per chapter; you know the rules."

[Flarecobra]

Upon hearing the cries/sobs/whatever it is they were doing, both mine and the nymph's head appeared around the rocky outcropping that we were behind. The Nymph, who's name I had found out was Gina, grinned and quickly swam up and headed to where a fallen book was, not even bothering to hide the fact that she was naked. I, meanwhile, took a couple minutes to make myself presentable, and then went to look for my swiped gear.

After a few minutes of searching, I found them, along with quite a few jewels, gold, and other shiny, expensive-looking stuff. "Hey, come check this out!" I called over to them while grabbing my stuff.

[Arhra]

Arhra rubbed her head woefully. Too much going on. Having just been in a swirling underwater melee didn't help either. "Alright!" she yelled, not an easy thing to do underwater, "We can get everything sorted out when there's some dry land to stand on!"

* * *

Some dry land later, the NPFer's found themselves in a sort of grotto, small rockpools dotting the uneven ground, niches set in the walls, clams and strangely coloured weeds all over the place, the walls wet and the constant dripping of water in the background.

"Well, that wasn't too bad." Arhra said. They hadn't even had to fight a giant octopus. She poked around curiously, seeing several of the clams were open, odd pearls visible inside.

Neatly stealing one, the clam slamming shut a split second later, Arhra held the multi-hued orb up to her eye and and looked at it curiously. A second later she popped it into her mouth and appeared to chew.

"Aha!" She cried triumphantly. "Just as I suspected! These pearls aren't pearls at all. They're made of raw chaos. An attempt to safely deal with the rising levels of Chaos in the Temple. And do you know what that means?!"

Arhra allowed a moment's silence before continuing, "I just wanted to impress you with my deductive capabilities!" She paused a moment, raising a finger to her lip as if trying to think of something important. "Oh yes, none of you try to eat them."

"Now then," Arhra clasped her hands energetically. "I suppose we'd better get things sorted out. I seem to recall someone mentioning an instruction booklet for that staff. Someone! Read it and figure out how to use it to switch people back to their original forms. I'm sure most of them prefer their regular gender." Arhra tossed the magical staff at someone, having been the one to pick it up off the floor.

"Anyone who needs to be healed to stop their limbs falling off or whatever, go find a healer." Arhra scanned around, "Those two!" she said, indicating Mauve and Flare. Technically her magic could also be used to heal, but it was best not to rely on it, as it was... tempermental.

"Hydra, go find our emergency food supply! I feel like chicken tonight." The serpentine girl nodded and started looking for Hawk. "Flare, tell me, why is there a nymph following you around? Anyone else doing something, hurry up and do it! Arhra, go scout ahead! Hydra, listen to Flare's explanation to tell to Arhra."

And with that, Arhra turned and marched off. Very shortly afterwards, she marched back. "There's a giant toad blocking the tunnel ahead. I think it drank the water supposed to be in this part." she declared. "Don't worry, I know what to do. What we need is an eel."

And indeed, she did speak truth. A giant toad really did block the hall ahead. The creature was ridiculously puffed up, eye goggling, and completely blocked the tunnel. It had shown no immediate sign of murderous intent, but neither did it show any sign of moving.

OOC: Very vague on the details since there's a lot of people involved in different stuff. If you had anything left to resolve, do it in your next post. On the matter of the staff, we now have the instruction booklet, although its very difficult to understand. Its default setting of just gender switching can be set without too much difficulty and return people to their original forms. It is likely to play up if you try anything more advanced though. Oh, and there's a frog.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

"Hydra, go find our emergency food supply! I feel like chicken tonight."

"I AM NOT A BLOODY CHICKEN!!"

Hawk appeared behind the group, mercifully back in his cursed form (unbreakable curses are still yadda yadda...), looking slightly worse for wear. Underwater explosions tend to have that effect though, especially when you're in the epicenter of said explosion.

He took another wobbly step forward and collapsed.

"Need... HEAL..."

[Bailey]

Syttulg chose that moment to rise out of the water, still trailing tentacles, and stalk over. It seemed that he was carrying a watertight zipped up bag of some sort, possibly the kind that might hold an encyclopedia collection.

"Didn't want to leave this behind," he offered as an explanation for why it took so long for him to exit the water.

[mammothtank]

Happy to to be out of the sub and on land again, MT stretched, sat down next to the wall, and listened as Arhra gave out orders to the group at large. Thankfully, none of them applied to MT, so she just sighed and leaned back, awaiting the arrival of the staff instruction booklet and pondering the situation. "Wait, what if I..." She began rummaging through her bag and finally pulled out a small object, which she hid from view in her fist. "Just in case..." she whispered.

Presently, a loud and very beaten-up bird waddled toward the group. "Need... HEAL..." was all he managed as he collapsed.
Standing up, MT pocketed what she was holding. "Geez dude, you look like crap." Once again rummaging through the aforementioned bag, she pulled out a pair of Hi-Potions and quickly applied them to the injured Hawk. "There, how's that?" she asked, smiling.

[Flarecobra]

"Fine, fine..." I said. As soon as we had got to dry land, I changed back to human and got changed, behind a wall of fire. Just as I was about to heal the bird, the Nymph chanted a quick spell, and Hawk's wounds suddonly started to heal up, and new strength flowed into him. "Wow....guess there is a reason to keep you." I said, looking at the Nymph. "Thank you Mistress." She said. "Don't call me Mistress." I said. "Oh, and if you're going to be staying female MT, I think you might want some better-fitting armor..." I said, still adjusting my armor as we moved. As soon as I heard her say that we needed an eel, I looked at Phil. "Sounds like a job for you." I said, thankful that someone healed him before we left.

[Tarrin]

The almost lifless form of Tarrin bobbed on top of the water close to the small Isle that the Npfer's had come apon, Drowning was not a problem he/she still being in the Mer form however the blood draining from the gaping wound in his/her chest may be a problem in the upcoming moments should none notice his/her problem.
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Light and dark swirled in Tarrins vision, the world was Light and wonderful, the sun shone down on the dafadil encrusted country side, the large checkered picnic blanket was spread on the crest of the tallest hill, large oak branches spreading out giving just enough shade to the two figures engaged in the romantic lunch.

Tiny lights danced across the spread of sandwiches, fruit, pastries and other assorted foods, Sparkling liquid filled wine glasses and two horses stood feeding on the green grasses not far away.
"Oh darling" the womans voice came wafting threw the air to settle in Tarrins ears "How wonderful this day has been"
"Yes my darling wonderful indeed"Tarrins eyes searched the gentle rolling hills around them as the day rolled over him.

the conversation continued for several minutes talk of happyness and love filled the morning air, Then Tarrin turned to look his love in the eyes.

A look of horror impacted on Tarrins face, the eyes he looked into were black and swirling with chaos, the aura around her dark and forboding, the lovely day turned dark and the colors of the land mixed making dark and dread colors not natural in the least.

"A....Arhra how, what"Tarrin was aghast
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"NNNNnnoooooooooo" Tarrin woke for a moment before the loss of blood overcame him again and darkness took him.

[phil_]

"Eel! Frog! Yes, Flare, this does look like a job for me!" Phil yelled excitedly. Phil held his open hand over his head and yelled "●Summon: Healing Shiv!" A hunk of pointed, silver-colored wood fell into Phil's hand. Phil spun around, lept at Tarrin's floating corpse, and yelled "Come back to life!" as he plunged the point into Tarrin's back.

Leaving the shiv sticking out of Tarrin (so it could take effect, not because he was too lazy to remove it), Phil walked back to where he'd been. "Yep, a job well done. Though, you coulda got that, Flare. MT already smashed a bottle in Hawk's face. Eh," Phil shrugged, "guess you couldn't've known that she'd be so hurt, yeah?" Phil started walking toward the frog, but stopped and said, "Huh. That was kinda rude. Forgive me, Flare and Flare's new boo."

That oughta keep me outta trouble, Phil thought as he again started toward the frog. Phil rubbed his chin as he considered the frog from several angles. I'd like to try dealing with this non-violently, though I know it can't work. Lesse, what'll make a frog move?... "Ah ha!" Phil started gently poking the frog. "Who's a pretty chicken, huh? Are youse a pretty chicken? Oh yes you are! Yes you are!" Phil continued to lightly prod the frog and coo to it, hoping that it would get uncomfortable and go away.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

Health and energy rushed through Hawks body, rejuvinating him completely. Then it happened again, as yet more healing took place.

Needless to say, the rush was quite incredible.

One moment Hawk was lying on his face, the next, he was back in the air, now fully powered up.

"Woow!! Now that's what I call a pick-me-up!"

He then realised he was still soaking wet. Well, that was easy to remedy. He began conjuring a gale and directed it to swirl around himself, drying himself off in seconds.

"Ah, much better. Now, what's the next task?"

He now saw the giant frog blocking the corridor.

"Huh, interesting..."

"Who's a pretty chicken, huh? Are youse a pretty chicken? Oh yes you are! Yes you are!"

"Phil_, I doubt that's a very good idea. It may get a bit, you know, agitated!"

[Bailey]

Syttulg lashed out with a tentacle, possibly snaring Hawk, and then walked over to the giant amphibian.

"Awww, it's so cute and cuddly. Makes me just want to grab and squeeze."

Syttulg patted the increasingly embarrassed roadblock.

[Arhra]

Hydra, finding Hawk had already ran off, briefly paused to collect the Staff of Gender Inversion and its instruction booklet. It appeared Arhra had either delegated the duty of figuring it out to a giant clam, or wasn't a very good aim when throwing artifacts about the place.

She also had to find out about that nymph, but Flare seemed busy. Hydra sidled up to the nymph, Gina, "Uh... Hello!" Hydra said timidly. "So... uh ... Do you like... stuff?"

* * *

"Ah, much better. Now, what's the next task?" Hawk asked, in front of the giant frog.

"The next task, my dear Hawk," the voice came dramatically from behind a few seconds later, "Is dinner."

"Hmm, I could have been sure you'd managed to turn yourself into a delicacy for our convenience." Arhra said, walking up and eyeing the former peafowl suspiciously. Her expression turned devillish as she crouched in front of the bird, "Ah well, there's not much in the way of cooking facilities around here anyway." She patted him absently on the head and then abruptly stood again, walking around him to look at the frog.

Phil and Newb were industriously prodding it, the creature seemed to be shifting in its place uncomfortably, possibly in embarassment, as Phil cooed to it.

"I don't suppose you'd happen to have any nifty powers able to be stolen would you?" Arhra asked it, quirking her head inquisitively as she looked at the creature. She'd had a bad case of the Blue Mage's Lament lately. "I suppose being able to inflate yourself by drinking a lot of water is kind of nifty... That is what you're full of, right?" It could just be toad mucus after all.

Agitated to action by the prodding and cooing, eyes goggling madly and its great bulk quivering, the toad spoke.

"WARRRK."

That wouldn't have been too bad, if it hadn't been accompanied by a great rush of surprisingly pure water coming out of the beast's mouth. A tidal wave thundered down the corridor, the great volume of water almost completely flooding the place. The great swell of water diminished somewhat as it flowed back down the corridor, past where the toad had blocked it. The water level dropped, though being waist height at best. In the aftermath, as the NPFers picked themselves up again, a little frog industriously kicked away, riding a final swell.

[Bailey]

Being a plant, Syttulg had a +3 on all saving throws against being swept away, but unfortunately he must have rolled a two, as he got swept along nonetheless.

He picked himself back up, and then picked up the hobbit with a couple of tentacles, sitting it on his shoulder.

"Short folks don't like water too much, I'm guessing."

[phil_]

Phil grinned, once again on Syttulg's shoulders. "Aww, you just like holding me. It's ok, nothing to be ashamed of." Pointing foward, Phil commanded, "Now, onward to the next chance for my brilliance to save the day once more!"

It wouldn't be surprising if Syttulg, at this point, let Phil hobbit paddle the rest of the way.

[Bailey]

"You know, I still have that CD. Not sure how, since it came with the sub and I put it in the player in any case, but it's right here." Syttulg held up a disc. "Since I like holding you so much, I'll let you listen."

A slot opened in the plant man's throat, and he popped the disc in.

"WHAT IS LOVE!? BABY DON'T HURT ME! DON'T HURT ME, NO MORE!"

[Flarecobra]

Nymph was about to speak when the Tidal wave came through, which caused her to cry out in surprise. Dispite being a strong swimmer, she was thrown end over end due to her being a lightweight.

I, meanwhile, heard the oncoming wall of water, and cried out "Cover!" and took refuge behind a rock to lessen the blow, but when it struck, I was still seeing stars from the impact. Amazingly though, my helmet stayed on the entire time. As soon as we were able to stand, I shook my head and said "Everyone all right?" "I'm fine Mistress..."the Nymph said, dispite a nice-sized bruse on her shoulder. "Don't call me mistress." I automatically said, as I looked over the others.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

A tentacle lashed out at Hawk and attempted to snare him, but it was a lazy and half-hearted attempt, Syttulg seemed more pre-occupied with the giant toad and his heart didn't seem to be in it. Hawk dodged to the side and then glared at Syttulg. "Don't make me kill you Fauna-boy!"

"The next task, my dear Hawk," the voice came dramatically from behind, "Is dinner."

"Hmm, I could have been sure you'd managed to turn yourself into a delicacy for our convenience."

...

"Ah well, there's not much in the way of cooking facilities around here anyway."

Hawk glared at Arhra as well. "Don't make me kill you eith-"

"WARRRK."

His attention now returned to the giant obstacle ahead and the wall of water that poured from its mouth.

"Aww crap, I only just got dry!"

Desiring much to remain dry Hawk began beating another gale towards the onrushing flood, the force carrying him backwards down the tunnel. But the gale was not enough to divert the water away from Hawk as it finally caught up and dragged him down and along with its wake.

When it finally settled, he came up gasping for air, flapping his wings fiercely to get airborne again. The whole place was flooded at about a normal humans waist height, but that was of no use to him, what with his small stature. He quickly scanned the area for any kind of platform he could use and quickly found one.

However, the platform he had intended to land upon was already taken by Phil_. Not to be put out, Hawk simply landed on Phils shoulders instead.

"Now, onward to the next chance for my brilliance to save the day once more!", Phil_ commanded.

"I assume you have a plan then?" He asked the hobbit.

[Flarecobra]

"At least it's just water." I said, slaughing through it. "And the toad's gone."

[Tarrin]

The healing shiv did it's job and Tarrin found the world coming back to him, as he stood however a large gush of water hit him and he was thrown back into a rough wall, Once again darkness overcame him, this time it was but for a moment however and he awoke moments later to see Phill and hawke looking like a totem on an outcroping not far away.

A small pain in his back made Tarrin reach around and ull the shiv from it, the shiv bubbled and disolved in his grasp as it's healing magic finnaly gave out.
"Who stabbed me? who stabbed the dead guy??" Tarrin looked around trying to figure out who had doen it when his eyes came apon Arhra, He averted his gaze quickly and gave up his search, choosing instead to follow the Npf horde down the corridor.

[Lumaes]

GAZE INTO THE MIRROR OF THE PAST

The staff flared and issued scalding bolts into the water, as they struck and blossomed their targets into absurd creatures of objectified sensuality Madame Lume’s eyes blazed. She dropped the skinny rusalka and through force of presence drove the melee away from her. Her voice rolled forth as inescapable as nightfall, heavily honeyed with deadly venom.
“The plague manifests another symptom; we are caught in the thrall of these vile purveyors of sickness. Beauty!? Sensuality!? Who is it that commands these impossible standards?” with sweep of the hand she signalled the magic infused women, “It is a subjugation and worse, a contagion. Instead of embracing the creatures we are we throw ourselves into the mindless pursuit of these impossible standards. Instead of being happy we must be disgusted with our shape. This is the illness and only we can be the cure.
Ignore these filth peddlers, not just for yourselves and your own self-worth” she smiles benignly on her congregation, “But for the future! – already the pressure of pleasuring another with shape and form drives women and men into mental illness and skeletal wasting, how many girls and boys of the future will die trying to pursue the only mystical artefact capable of gifting this vile new superficiality!? You are objectified, dressed in skimpy clothes and in service to one creature, how can you be yourselves when your life is an adornment? You can change”
The devotees of her new cause crowded around her, casting their hands into the air as they implore her in chorus;
“Madame Lume, help us to be better people!!”

KABOOM
Madame Lume had disdainfully ignored the overly flashy death FMV of the Merthing, in her day stage-craft had far superior subtlety not to mention better dialogue. Nevertheless it still signalled the end of fearsome battle, she smiled benignly once more to her feminist converts and left them in a cascade of pamphlets as she was whisked away to drier ground.

THE MIRROR GROWS CLOUDY AS THE PRESENT APPROACHES

“Bother!” thundered the stole clad figure of Madame Lume as Phil’s unsettling (some would say down-right creepy) attentions caused the frog to erupt in a fearsome torrent of water, she was battered and knocked down by the powerful stream, vanishing beneath the frothy crest of the waves. She stayed out of sight for a frighteningly long time…
The pale face erupted from the water in front of the fleeing frog, eyes blazing with untold wickedness, though instead of mutilating the cute little amphibian in a blazing display of yang she instead cupped the creature in two, boned hands and cuddled it to her bosom in a tribute to the softer yin.
“ooooo” she cooed to the squirming wet thing, “I will name you Tiddles” and that, was that.

[Arhra]

Arhra rose out of the water like an unusually alluring sea monster, chest heaving as she gasped in air. She was also dripping wet and angry. Being almost washed away and cheated of an attempt to get an interesting new power did not a happy Arhra make.

Syttulg choose this time to insert a CD into his neck and play some 'music'. He also made the cardinal sin of mentioning the 's' word a few seconds earlier. Arhra punched him in the throat.

"And let that be a lesson to you." she said. Thankfully, that seemed to supress any murder urges she might have for the moment.

Hydra had just about to get a reply from Gina (aka that nymph) when a rather impolite tidal wave butted in on the conversation. Gina was swept away, Hydra, being much heavier, remained in pretty much the same place. Feeling somewhat dazed, she broke the surface again and bent over, heads almost touching the the receding water, coughing up water. It was almost cute, if you think a number of little snakes sneezing is cute.

She paused to check she still had the Staff of Gender Inversion and its instruction booklet. Someone would probably want to use them soon, despite the failure of delegation. Hydra didn't believe she could be of any help in that - she was illiterate. Resigned to safeguarding them for now, she went with the others.

Travelling further in, the temple continued in the theme of finely crafted hallways, with a watery motif but the air steadily grew colder, frost beginning to appear on the walls and the NPFer's breaths raising clouds of mist. Even the fluid carvings on the wall began to change, turning to the crystalline patterns of snowflakes. It was freezing.

The NPFers dealt with it as best they could. Arhra, in her attempt to get some cold weather wear, had fortuitiously managed to conjure up a wardrobe full of ancient fur coats and mothballs. A quick test for how deep it went revealed the backing exactly where it should be. How disappointing.

Arhra feeling a little concerned for Hydra's sake - reptiles and cold don't generally mix well after all. Even rugged up in a number of fur coats and long scarves to act as neck warmers (for she had a lot of neck), she was looking miserable. Some supernatural source of cold seemed to be ahead, making the place far cooler than it should be.

The hall widened into a greater chamber, its dimensions hidden by the heavy snowfall inside it. The ground was thick with snow, some of it having spilled into the hall. No-one really raised an eyebrod at it snowing in doors - this sort of thing was becoming fairly par for the course.

There was nowhere to go but onwards. Arhra was successfully talked out of improvising a sleigh that would be drawn by some of the NPFers and then they plunged onwards, into the blinding snow. Drifts of snow were piled up, but thankfully the snow wasn't too thick on the ground in most places. It was hard to keep everyone in sight, the shifting whiteness playing tricks on the eye. Arhra thought she saw shadows moving in the swirling whiteness and paused, blinking eyelashes laden with snowflakes to try and clear her vision.

The shapes plodded forwards on stubby legs, a low moaning undercutting the wind, their pale forms becoming visible. They had rounded, plump bodies, round heads ridiculously adorned with ancient, battered stove-pipe hats. These snow dusted hats were the colour of pitch, filled with manevolent shadow that almost seemed to overflow from them, the only colour on the creatures aside from the dotted darkness of their smiling mouths, the two lumps of faceted blackness that made their eyes and the jolly scarves wrapped about their thick necks.

Snowmen! All around them! As scary as they might be, at least these ones didn't have brooms or branch arms with which to poke out eyes. On instinct, Arhra ducked, as twin crimson beams leapt from a snowman's eyes to pass where her head had been just a moment ago. Oh, eye lasers. That was worse. Some tossing snowballs that were more solid lumps of ice than an object of fun and others firing harmful rays from their eyes, the abominable snowmen closed in.

OOC: Dun dun dun! See the discussion thread (http://forum.nuklearpower.com/showpost.php?p=479672&postcount=21) for details. May want to put some thoughts into your protection from the cold too. while I think of it, if you're wanting to retunr to normal form, you'll have to do it yourself. Just get the booklet and staff off Hydra and pry the way to get the default setting out of the gibberish book.

[Bailey]

It should be noted that Syttulg has absolutely terrible taste in music, and did not actually consider the CD bad. Syttulg looked surprised when Arhra punched him. "Oh, did you want a ride too? I think I still have more room, but three is about the limit."

Thankfully, the music stopped.

As it got colder, Syttulg shuddered. "I'm not heading into that killing frost unprepared. I'll freeze my tomatoes off." He turned around and trudged back into the water, then hollowed out the majority of his tentacles and plunged them in. Filling them up, he began heating the water in them.

"Hey, can I get a recharge? I just need someone to cast a lightning spell on me."

Whether he got said recharge or not, he would trudge onwards with the others. Seeing the snowmen, he muttered. "Oh you've got to be kidding me." He shook his head and then began aiming his tentacles about. "Time to mist." With that, he began spraying fine water particles, creating an effect much like an ice storm, with the water freezing on contact with solid objects. He had to be careful though, or he would use too much of his heated water and freeze himself.

[Flarecobra]

By the time that we could start seeing our breathes, I was already bitching about the cold, punctuated by suddon bursts of fire on myself to keep myself warm. Gina, however, was clearly shivering, though I blame the fact that barely wore anything on that. Once Arhra started handing out cold-weather stuff to Hydra, Gina ducked in and grabbed the first thing that was closest to her and threw it on. Naturally, it ended up being one of the snow-bunny outfits, tight enough to show off her body while being quite warm.

(To be continued)

[Tarrin]

As the snow started to show and the cold cold air filtered thru to the NPF, Tarrin decided warmth was what was needed and changed form to that of a large polarbear, the snow nolonger having an effect on him he strolled along till Arhra's runin with the horde of snowmpeople.

the iceballs were not that much of a factor to the great hulking Tarrin but those lasers were definately not something to be messed around with, charging the nearest attacker two massive claws crushed the snowman from head to toe, the hat that had been on it's head flew off and landed on a snow drift not far away.

Thinking his foe done Tarrin started to charge the next snowman in line, thistime bearreling thru the snow like a truck.
The hat thistime fell onto Tarrin it's rimmed teath bitting deep into the hide of the form the spirit walker had taken, pain shot up his side and Tarrin started slacsing at the hat with his sharp claws, the hat was nimble and managed to dodge most of his attacks untill a claw caught a piece of it and nailed it to the floor.

Looking at both ends of the hat strugling to bite at him Tarrin decided to show the vile piece of clothing how exactly a bite should be, He closed his powerful jaws around the hat and shook as hard as possible, the bits of the hat that remained were nolonger bothersome apart to the cleaner of this seal's dungeon anyway.

[Steel Shadow]

Steel, having taken appropriate action when he saw the flood coming, was only soaked from his waste down. Whilst this was a lot better than being completely drenched, Steel was very much the "The glass is half empty" type. His complaints became steadily darker and longer as it got colder, only stopping when his teeth began to chatter to much for him to talk.

Luckily Arhra summoned a wardrobe of warm, if old and musty, clothes. He snagged a few using his largely underused telekinesis powers, and put them on, his rampant paranoia subdued by the cold. Plus Arhra had already poisoned him, what more was there?

He really hoped she wouldn't answer that.

"I th-th-thought this was the www-water temple, not annn ice temple." He muttered as he began wading through the snow. "Arr-rre you surr-rre we're in the rr-right place?"

Whatever answer might have been forthcoming was cut off as crimson light sliced through the miniature blizzard. Steel tried to dodge to the side, before remembering he was covered in some very bulky clothing and falling flat in the snow. The laser passed over him harmlessly. Well, unless there was someone behind him, but who cares about them?

Stumbling to his feet, he looked around. Apparently they were now under siege by evil snowmen. Oh how he wished that this was the most unusual thing that had happened to him today. He drew his sword, charging at the nearest top-hatted fiend. Or waddled at it anyway. He had a feeling this wasn't going to go well.

[Flarecobra]

When everyone was getting dressed in cold weather-gear, I stripped off my armor behind a wall of fire along with the other girls, and put on some warm underclothes before putting back on my armor.

Once on the snow flats, I shivered and said "I don't think even fire'll help too much here..." Just as I said that, a pair of red beams crossed overhead. "Fuck! Ok......let's try this on for size..." I said, as I readied a Flare and launched it at the nearest Snowman.

[mammothtank]

Now clad in a coat, extra pants, and a muffler, MT was having problems similar to those of Steel Shadow - namely, she couldn't move as agilely as usual with so much winter gear (and snow, for that matter) in the way. Her experience with armor made it a little easier to manage, but not by much.

Slowly charging at a distracted snowman, MT shouted "Concentration !!" and swung her sword at it horizontally. The blade sliced straight through the snowman's torso and dragged the upper half away with it. However, this caused the hat it was wearing to blow off and fly right at her face. She managed to catch it with one hand, at which point it immediately began trying to chomp her hand off. "GAAH!" she shouted, reflexively throwing the hat in a random direction. She then noticed that the severed snowman upper half, though unmoving, was staring at her, so she squashed it with the flat of her blade. "It is way too cold in here!" she whined.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

"Must... keep... moving... to... stay... warm. Must... keep... warm... to... stay... alive!"

Hawk was coping with the cold as best as he could, his feathers providing at least some heat, but he didn't have the benefit of warm clothes as most of the others did. He flew through the indoor blizzared, his wings becoming snow covered and heavy even as he beat them to keep the blood circulating.

Below him the snowfiends began their inevitably futile attempt to make war on the NPF, lasers lashing out, ice balls flung like shots from slings, as several members moved in for some healthy CQC.

Hawk however decided to keep his distance, and readied a blast at the nearest foe. But as he bagan pulling in the air something odd happened; the falling snow was also being drawn in with it. As he forced the airblast into existence, it swirled down and the flakes formed into a perfect ball of compacted snow, hanging in its centre. Needless to say Hawk was quite bemused by this new development. He pondered the ice shot and immediately began analysing its potential in all possible battle scenarios. I can fire this as a weapon! My god, I've got a new ability! If I can do this with snow, maybe I can do it with fire, water, even earth!

Suddenly Tarrin was tearing into one of the snowmens hats, and as it caught Hawks keen eye, he realised even more: That hat was moving! It was fighting back (or trying to).

"Thinking caps!" Now he knew what to target, Hawk fired the air/ice blast.

It struck between the head and the hat of the snowman, the head collapsed from the solid air that struck it but the shot continued onwards and smacked into the hat, sending it hurtling out of sight. With the hat removed, the SM collapsed.

Just then, for no real reason, and defying all known dimensional laws, a large two-dimensional box appeared in three-dimensional space. A fanfare accompanyed it.

Hawk has learned the ability Elemental shot!

It vanished before anyone could comment on it.

Inspired by the effectiveness of the attack he began charging another, but just as the shot formed, red light flashed in front of him, striking the center of the sphere and blowing it to pieces. The blast was powerful enough to knock Hawk clean out of the sky, and he fell to earth hard.

[mauve]

Mauve knew exactly how to stop the snowy menace.

"Ha!" she cackled. "I know exactly how to stop you!" She bundled the fur coat she appropriated from the wardobe around herself and sat down in the snow.

"All I have to do is wait for global warming to melt you all away," she said. "Then you'll be sorry. Wait for it."

But alas, global warming was too busy being discussed or ignored in other parts of the world to come to Mauve's aid, and in about twenty seconds she was bored of sitting. Tch. The one time it might prove useful for something...

"New plan," she declared. "Direct approach." Clouds of blackish-purple magic energy swirled around her clenched fists. The mage charged towards the nearest snowman, dodging nimbly as an eye-laser blast hit the ground which she had previously occupied.

Now! One booted foot thrust downwards onto the rolling snowdrift on which she she ran, launching the mage into a super-cool leap towards her snowy prey. While in midair, she hurled the orbs of dark magic energy at the snowman, one after the other. In the NPF Avatars DVD, this was done with a really neat slow-mo sequence.

The magic orbs impacted with the snowman, one hitting its head and the other its chest, blowing out large holes into its body that would have been really gruesome had it been made of anything other than mere snow. Game over.

Mauve landed on the ground a split second later with the muted crunch of boots on snow. She advanced slowly on her fallen adversary.

"You were a worthy opponent, Oh Frosty," she said dramatically, nudging a lump of melting snow that once served as part of its head. "Your brave fighting spirit will never be forg-- HOLY CRAP THE HAT IS POSSESSED!!!!!!" The seemingly unassuming stovepipe hat was now growling and snarling, and trying to bite Mauve's foot off. Mauve yelped in surprise and kicked it out of the way.

Well, this was going to be more interesting.

[Flarecobra]

"Wait...Fire melts ice! Give me some cover!" I said, moving to the back of the group, grinning. It had been a while since I've used this perticular attack, bit in this case, it'd be SO worth it. Closing my eyes, balls of fire began to form around me, then after a few seconds, they shot up in the air, turning into storm clouds, which then started to grow. "Firestorm." I said, grinning as I kept up th econsentration to provide the fuel for the spell, which was harder then usual due to the cold. After about a minute, they covered the entire ceiling of the chamber. And that's when the fun started. Only a couple came down at a time, but soon it started to rain Fireballs.

I stopped focusing on the spell to look over the other NPFers, as the first fireballs landed, but I noticed something. They seemed to lose power as they fell, then I remembered. Melting snowflakes made water drops, and at the rate the snow was falling, it was diffusing the fire's potency. "Shit...." I said, and I had to keep all my focus on maintaining the spell, but even so, the fireballs were losing about half their power falling and hitting the snow.

[phil_]

Phil had dug a small trench (pretty much, he'd rolled on his back a few times) and was surveying the situation from there. In the time since they'd entered the snow, Phil had henshin-ed from his space suit to his summoner's robe, which mysteriously now had a blue fur lining. Why he had changed from a climate controlled suit that could withstand the vacuum of space into an old Halloween costume remains unexplained, as does the origin of the blue fur.

Right, thinking time. Hello, italics; let's play. There are snowgoons. They seem to be vulnerable to massive trauma. That's novel, considering the magical weirdos the NPF tends to pick fights with. Not that we're letting that stop us from being flashy. Phil was probably refering to the raining fireballs, bolts of fell magic, and polar bear-ering. So, what can cause massive amounts of damage while keeping me relatively safe?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/96/Killdozer.jpg

"Ah, yes, that will do nicely." Phil stood up in his dent in the snow. "●Summon: Bulldozer!" The room (or what they could see of it) filled with the sound of an idling diesle engine. With a burst of black smoke, a yellow Caterpillar bulldozer crashed to the snow a few feet to Phil's side. Phil climbed in and started pulling levers. "Ok," CRASH! "that moves the shovel up and down," VROOM! "aaand that pulls it outta neutral." The treads spun in the ditch the dozer had made when it fell, then suddenly caught and the bulldozer was off. Technically, Phil should've summoned a snowplow, but the bulldozer was effective enough, judging from how the snowmen he managed to slide the monsterous machine into 'sploded on impact. As he tried to turn around for another run, the dozer tipped on its side and fell over. Crawling out of the now skyward door, Phil noticed a line of mushed hats and felt like he'd made an awful mistake.

But rampaging in a bulldozer was worth a little tactical backlash.

OOC: Let's say I hit three.

[Bailey]

Syttulg was about to blast another hat with water to soak it and hopefully freeze it solid, but a shimmering portal appeared in front of him and Naymedo stepped out, followed by a burly man with pink hair and a strange belt.

"Syttulg, come with me. There isn't much time to explain."

"But I have to help fight the snowmen!"

"Mr. Rosewood, handle it."

The pink headed man nodded and grabbed a ball off of his belt, revealing it to be a pokeball. "Let's go, Chef! Use Sunny Day!" A typhlosian appeared and seemed to do something. Abruptly, the weather changed to be broad sunlight, (despite the fact that they're indoors, yes, don't ask,) weakening the power of ice moves, strengthening fire moves, and boosting the speed and dexterity of plant moves. "Return!" The typhlosian was recalled.

Syttulg looked at Naymedo. "Fine, I'm coming."

The three headed through the portal, which promptly dissapeared.

[Arhra]

Arhra charged the snowman that had fired its eye lasers at her, coat flapping wildly about her. It hurled a snowball at her, glancing painfully off her shoulder. Arhra winced, those things were practically solid ice. Arms outstretched, Arhra plucked out the snowman's still glowing coal eyes and tackled the creature to the ground.

One leg crumbled as Arhra landed heavily on it, scampering to her feet a moment later. Draining the last of the power out of the coal-eyes in her hand, she was confused as they then crumbled away to nothing in her hands.

"Poorly built snowman eh?" Arhra asked the one-legged, blind snowman as it groped around, scraping up snow with its cold arms and packing it into a new leg. Deciding she wasn't going to have any of this "Oh look, I can repair myself from the surrounding terrain" nonsense, Arhra moved to attack again.

She was surprised a second time to find two more coals emerge from the blank whiteness of the snowman's empty eye sockets. As they glowed to fire, Arhra thrust her hand forwards and tried to feel absorbant, like a sponge. The beams were caught in her cupped hand, pulsing there as a crimson globe, stray beams shooting out at random angles before it dissipated. It was much more painful for Arhra than it looked, although it was quite stylish.

Arhra then gleefully kicked and stomped the snowman into the ground, clenching her wounded hand. Its hat then launched itself out of the snow at her face, Arhra just managing to grab it. She held it frantically just a few inches from her face, it's top flapping open and shut like jaws, pearly teeth gnashing and a long, black tongue slipping out to lash at her face.

"How do you kill these things?!" Arhra cried.

Various experiments were underway.

Tarrin tore a hat apart, darkness saturating every strip. But, not even this could stop it. The power in them endured. The rags and tags twitched, rising up to dance on their edges. Squirming in a way the eye couldn't quite follow, each one bcame a tiny top hat, a miniscule pop accompanying each transformation.

A hiss like steam escaping from a kettle rose from them as they all leapt at the pale bulk of Tarrin's ursine form, clinging on with their vicious little teeth.

In the meantime, Phil's little bulldozer rampage had the incredible fortune of having chanced upon a vulnerability of the demon-hats.

The hats were possessed of a malevolent will. It filled them almost to overflowing, a pulsing morass of evil inside them. Flattening the hats in such a way was like squeezing a pimple. Something vapourous, slithering and dark was forced out of each one as it was flattened, writhing helplessly in the air before oozing to the ground, fading to nothing as they went. It was certainly easier to perform than your average exorcism.

"Why didn't I think of that?!" Arhra asked herself, "How many perfectly good top hats have been ruined by being sat on? It's so obvious!" The hat she'd been wrestling with was mostly pacified now, energy drain seeming to have tired it out. To be on the safe side, Arhra threw it to the ground and then, while it was still dazed, promptly sat on it.

Hydra had been staggering around, the snow and the cold having seriously confused her senses. She'd been having trouble finding the battle, but still endangered by stray snowballs, eye beams, some kind of freezing mist, orbs of dark magic and fireballs. A bird then fell on her, sliding off and hitting the ground in front of her.

"The emergency food supply!" she declared in shock. Knowing Arhra thought the bird was important, Hydra quickly grabbed Hawk off the ground and tucked him under her coat to help keep him warm. Not that reptiles were especially warm. Hydra trudged on, feeling the feathery bundle of warmth beneath her heavy fur coat.

OOC: I've more covered some significant events with the hats powers than responded to every action, as that gets very complex outside of something like a boss battle, which has a singular target. Fortunately Tarrin, the hats can't really do serious damage to a bear, but it is certainly freaky. On this note, immoblising the hats somehow, like encasing them in a block of ice (while not on a snowman obviously, otherwise they'd still be mobile) or some manner of exorcism would also have worked.

[Tarrin]

Tarrin watched as the shreads of the hat reformed into miniture versions of their previous form and started to attack him, "You gotta be shitin me" was what went through Tarrins mind however in bear form the only thing that came out was a loud "roargrrawwow".

Small hats bit at him left right and centre though not doing much damage they were everywhere and distracting Tarrin from helping with the other snowmen, swiping around each claw caught nothing but air as the tiny hats dodged around, Tarrin was left with only one thing left to do Stop, Drop and roll, after all it worked for fire why not for hats.

After several moments of rolling the flea like bites subsided and nothing of the vile hats remained, Now understanding how to defeat the hats Tarrin changed tactics choseing to belly flop apon his next avesary thus squashing both snowman and hat in what was the worlds first Polarbear frog splash manover.

[Flarecobra]

The room started to heat up some, as the snow and snowmen began to melt, and any hats (And other airborne objects) were struck by fire, the hats being apperentally flammable, as they were quickly lit on fire. Maintaining the consentration needed was quite tiring, and I was nearing my limit.

[mauve]

The kicked hat was now rather put out. Mauve was circling it as it was doing something with the snow. Wait a minute.... It was... No. Yes! It was building a new snowman!

"Oh no you don't!" Mauve snarled. "I went to all that trouble to get rid of the first one!"

So she did the one thing any uber-powerful mage would do in such a situation.

She yelled a ferocious battle cry and stomped on it repeatedly. Although her attack was much less powerful than the bulldozer, it worked well enough. With a sickening pop, the hat's evil was released from its fibrous prison and floated away like a balloon of malice on a spring breeze.