Issue 1 Downtime

When the tunnel collapsed Sara wasn't too worried. She just shifted and moved along with the crumbling and moving stone until she could feel it come to a rest again. What she hadn't anticipated was how much this would mess with her orientation (and how much further down it had taken her when the stone masses had caused older tunnels further down to collapse as well) so when she moves through the stone in the direction she assumes the other rest of the team to be she's a little confused at how long it takes her to find open space again. And how different this tunnel looks.

"Okay, relax. I can't just go straight up until I hit the surface, I'm probably still under the hotel..." she mumbles to herself.

Everything in this tunnel was wet and water flowed in little rivulets across the floor, but it flowed in intricate patterns and occasionally uphill, heading down the tunnel towards a glow.

It was probably a bad idea to go off and investigate something, but you show a scientist (in training) water flowing uphill and they just gotta have an answer, even if it's just 'A Mutant Did It'. So Sara, shifted to look as much as the wall as possible, slowly made her way towards the glow, trying to stay out of the water to not make too much sound.

The tunnel opened up into a large room with columns. The floor of this room was covered in a thin layer of water. In the middle of the room, was a deep pool, towards which the water has flowing. A column of water grew out of the pool, supporting a metal platform. Sitting cross-legged on the platform was a blond woman. She might have once been pretty. She might even still be pretty if she cleaned up. As it was though, her face was smudged with dirt and her ragged clothes were a soggy mess.

Of course. Just missing Talia and Rick for the full set. she nervously jokes to herself. Someone who withdrew this far into the ground was bound to be too friendly for the world above or even worse. But if she wants to find the other X-Men again someone who's obviously native to these tunnels would be incredibly helpful...

Stepping away from the wall and into the opening to the room (but not into any water) Sara clears her throat to draw the woman's attention.

The woman's eyes flared with a blue glow and a watery form resembling an ancient Roman soldier rose out of the pool, marching towards Sara. "State your business." It looked like the watery soldier-construct's lips were moving and it sounded like he was speaking, but the woman's lips moved in time with the speech.

"Just... passing through?" she says carefully, more anxious about the rest of the water in the room than the construct. "I got seperated from my friends up there when a tunnel collapsed."

The woman seemed to consider that for a moment. "State your allegiance." Now that the construct was closer, Sara would be able to see that the detailing was meticulous down to the feathers in the crest of the helmet.

Show-off...

"I'm my own side." she says, figuring that's close enough to both the truth and what her counter-part in this world might say.

The construct collapsed, the water flowing back towards the pool as the blue glow faded from the woman's eyes. The water between Sara and the pool split, leaving a path of somewhat dry ground and the woman looked at her. She beckoned to Sara, waiting patiently.

Sara smirks. Wether it's a trap, a test or just common courtesy (yeah right), she's not about to fall for it. As she walks towards the 'path' the ground rises up in front of her to fill in the space left behind by the water, keeping her walking just above the waterline as she creates a stretch of ground up to the pool.

The column of water sank, bringing the platform lower. Now that Sara was closer, she would be able to see the surface of the columns on the sides facing the platform had been carved into relief images. The larger images all carried a horse motif while the supporting images showed people in various stages of life and death. The lines and surfaces were smooth and didn't look chisel carved.

"You are not one of the Generals lackeys. They are insufferably arrogant. And you're not one of the opposition. They don't have 'friends'. That makes you something of an oddity. And perhaps an intruder?" The woman looked at her intently.

"I'm just looking for my friends." she says calmly. Something about those 'carvings' seems oddly familiar though. Water... horses...

"Everyone is looking for something. I could find your friends, if they're in the tunnels somewhere. The real question is: Why should I help you?"

Dead people... offering to lead me somewhere... She thinks she's a Ceffyl Dŵr!

"And how do I know I can trust you?"

"You can't," she said. "But your other option is wandering the tunnels just hoping you run across your friends. You could do that for years."

"And what do you want in return?"

"What are you offering?" The water of the pool smoothed to a glassy calmness.

"Can't say I have much on me after squeezing through piles of rubble, but if you have any stone you need cleared out faster than you can do it yourself..."

"I could always use another room," she said, nodding. The water gently moved the platform away from the pool and set it down on the floor. She stood up stretching, "Follow me." She began walking towards the back of the room, water around her spinning up into flowing patterns in the air before settling back down into the water. The dry path for Sara suddenly continued around the pool, falling into step behind the woman.

Seriously? A whole room?

Trying not to groan Sara follows her, continuing to expand her stone-bridge to walk on.

In the back of the room stood two figures in riot-gear body armor. They flanked a small opening and as the woman approached, they snapped to attention and saluted. The body armor was extremely wet and there were no faces behind the face shields. Through the opening was a much smaller room lit by waterproof lights. Most of the room's furnishing consisted of a random assortment of junk, all showing signs of damage from the moist environment. If it were less creepy, damp, and cold, it might have been cozy. "I'd like another room, about the size of this one through there." She indicated an opening where it looked like water had been working on wearing away the beginnings of a new room. She dropped down into a throne-like chair made of an odd assortment of metal. "Do you think that a fair trade?"

"Do you have somewhere to dump the stone?"

"Could you dump it in the large room? In a pile or a block makes no difference. I've been needing new material to work with anyway."

"Sure, whatever."

Putting her hand on the beginning of the doorway Sara 'melts' along with part of the stone. A river of stone snakes through the room towards the previous one, flowing away from the room to be and into a growing cube on the other end, only making the faintest sound of rushing sand.

The woman watched with fascination, humming to herself as she absently fumbled in a box of junk. Finally, she asked, "Do you have a name?" She pulled out something that resembled a small knife and starting sharpening it.

"Flowstone." it comes from somewhere in the stream of, well, flowing stone.

"You're not from around here..." She snickered and gestured to the room, "Well, there's no one from around here, but you know what I mean." She eyed the knife, inspecting the edge and went back to sharpening it.

"No, I'm not. And I don't plan on staying long."

The woman clucked her tongue, "Testy, testy. You don't like it here?"

"So far I've been attacked by a building, an evil version of my husband, dumped in the sewers and had a tunnel collapsed on top of me. So no, I don't particularly like it here."

"Psh, you've been on the kiddy ride, Flowstone," she said before suddenly switching to a wistful tone, "not that I can blame you for wanting to be somewhere else."

"Oh so you're not just hiding down here because it's so cozy."

She jammed the knife into a piece of wood sitting nearby and stood up to argue with the stream of stone, "Hiding?! Who said anything about hiding? I'm not hiding!"

"Of course not. Love it here. So damp and musky. How long did it take you to erode out this room?"

"I don't remember," she said, crossing her arms. "Not like I have clocks down here now is it?" She seemed to be arguing with the air now.

"And why are you down here then?"

"Because maybe hell really is other people," she said. "Or maybe just existence is hell and down here I don't exist. Why would you care anyway? You just want to get back to your 'friends' and get out of here."

"I don't know... We have terrible people in our world, I'd like to believe that means there are decent ones here."

"Everyone has their own definition of 'decent' and the only 'decent' people that exist are the people that agree with you. That's the generic you, not the you in specific."