[Pokémon] A Smell of Petroleum Pervades Throughout

> Before you leave ask if she knows if any boats survived, if not we might have to take our chance and try and catch one of the Eldritch Krabbys and turn it into a personal ferry. Also if she'd be willing ask if she has a Pokegear, I mean I think we should give Falkner an update that 1. You've found information about the cause of all this and 2. THat you found another person who's sort of alive.

You already have a Pokégear, so you don't ask about that. You do, however, turn and ask about boats.

"There aren't any boats, are there?" you ask hopefully.

"NO," replies the stranger. "YOU SAW THE DOCK."

"Thought so," you sigh. "It seemed worth asking, though."

> At the risk of garnering a bit of unwanted memories, ask this person --who I assume is Jasmine-- about her Ampharos. On a side note to the Narrator, I'd like to say that I am loving the story so far. I have never been one to enjoy these sorts of stories, but this one has captivated me in a way similar to how a Barnacle catches unwitting Combine soldiers from its perch on a ceiling.

"Oh, and one more thing," you say. "What happened to the Ampharos here?"

"I KILLED HIM," replies the stranger. "HE WOULDN'T LEAVE, AND HE KEPT TRYING TO – TO EAT ME..."

Great. Now they're crying again. And you'd just built this up to a nice, neat little ending as well.

And you just bet that the bit about Barnacles will have given the Narrator a horrible idea to put something nasty above your head. You're going to be obsessively checking every ceiling you pass under for days after that thought.

In time, as ever, the stranger recovers, and once you've made sure they're OK it's time to leave. You don't want to outstay your welcome, if this person is capable of killing a fully-evolved Eldritch Pokémon.

> Take a moment to reflect on everything you know about the Whirl Islands. (Hey, if his astonishing level of expertise on eels is anything to go by, Othodox has hidden depths.) Maybe the gigantic city at the bottom of the sea is linked to the whirlpools... and could Lugia be mixed up in all this?
> On second thoughts, coming face-to-face with a highly intelligent, telepathic Legendary beastie who could apparently tear down cliffs by fluttering its wings even before everything went Eldritch... well, that might not be the best idea.
> Maybe there's room in the Lighthouse for two terrified humans to co-exist apathetically?

Ah, a descending elevator. The perfect environment for a little light musing. What to ponder, though?

Well, the Whirl Islands seem like a good place to start. They lie between you and your destination, and given that the caves beneath extend right down to the seabed and possibly below, they're about as close as you can get to the Deep One's natural environment.

However, the idea of an Eldrich Lugia is pants-wettingly terrifying, so you elect to abandon that line of thought immediately.

Hmm. How about eels? You have displayed some unusual knowledge of them, that's for sure, but no more than you'd get from reading the Swedish Sea and Water Authority webpage on them. You also know rather a lot about crabs, if your response to the Krabby or Kingler or whatever it was is anything to go by.

Perhaps as the player character certain knowledge comes hard-wired into your system? In a world where most evil seems to have crawled out of the sea, it might make sense to know this sort of thing.

> Ask about the state and/or existence of any boats in the harbor. Then, proceed out of the Lighthouse. Be careful though, there are Eldritch Krabby and Kingler out there, not to mention and Eldritch Cyndaquil/Quilava that's most likely actually an Eldritch Typhlolsion looking for you. Either way, you need a more effective way to either defend yourself or capture the Eldritch Pokemon. The Krabby may prove your only way to cross the ocean.

The crab in the lobby is dead.

You don't know how dead – the Eldritch Heracross still weighs heavily on your mind – but it's lying crumpled in one corner of the room, its blue blood congealing on its curled limbs. Even for an Eldritch Pokémon, that kind of wound's not going to heal easily – you think. Jawson has regrown a severed head multiple times, you realise.

Jawson. That reminds you: you were going to report back to Falkner. You step into the lift and close the doors for a moment, then call him.

---

A long, long way away, in the middle of dinner, there is a ringing noise from the mounds of loot; Falkner pushes past Clair, muttering angrily about cold callers interrupting everything, and roots through the heaps of supplies until he finds the object making the noise: a small, flat object with an oversized hinge. With a small noise of annoyance, he stomps it into oblivion and returns to the large rock that serves as his table.

"Sorry about that," he says to Clair, scratching that same area on the side of his head, nails drawing blood. "Now, where were we...?"

---

Hm. That's strange. No reply – and now the line's dead.

Well, you guess he did say he didn't want to see you again. Presumably he doesn't want to take your calls, either.

Shrugging, you walk out through the lobby, keeping one eye on the dead crab; at the door, you shift your items around to the familiar loadout: Vesta in the left hand, Hideously Dangerous Stabby Thing in the right.

hello you, says Vesta as you take her out of your Bag. She seems to be in a good mood, although you can't for the life of you see why. You're about to cross the sea, which you'd think would be a fire's least favourite place to be.

"My name is Othodox," you tell her, realising that you haven't told her this yet. "Like you're Vesta. I'm Othodox."

othodox... Vesta mulls it over for a moment as you open the door; she might conceivably have added more, but both of you are somewhat bowled over by the sight that greets you outside.

Fire.

Smoke.

Teeth.

Oh, crap.

Waiting at the point where the path turns down the hill is something half as long again as you are tall: a narrow band of blackened bones and brindled fur terminating in a huge, skinless head armed with the chisel-like teeth of a colossal rat.

Bloody eye-pits turn to you. The great teeth clack.

big vesta? asks Vesta hesitantly.

"Uh... no," you say, staring at the Eldritch Quilava. "No, Vesta, not quite."
 
First thought for the narrator 'Are you kidding me?!' Now that I got that out of my system back to the matter at hand,You may be too weak to fight this guy, Since your at the light house you're kind of cornered if your world geography is similar to game geography, First things first see if Vesta can communicate with the flames maybe get them to eat this thing. If that doesn't work see if there's even a slight chance of you and Vesta could survive jumping into the water.Right now pull out the poison stabby thing you made, If it comes down to it and he get's on top of you again or close enough you can hit him with it stab the crap out of his throat than kick him into the ocean. Good look man, we all knew this was coming I just thought we'd have a bit more time. If none of that works ask Tabiti for help you've done a lot to prove your devotion I think she could pull you from the flames once.
 
Pray to Tabiti that you come out of this alive. Right now, have your Hideously Dangerous Stabby Thing out and hopefully some MooMoo Milk on hand. You'll probably need it. See if there is any way it might chase you into the water or find some other way to try to put the flames on the Eldritch monster in front of you out. Pray that Tabiti understands why you must harm the fire.
 
Run back to the elevator and ride it back to, who I assume is, Jasmine. (If that doesn't work then try the stairs, though I doubt that'll work out too well. So may Tabiti have mercy on your soul if it comes to that, kid.) Curse her name for not warning you about the monster destroying the town (She can hear a pin drop from 6 feet above her, but not a town being set on fire?) Finally, apologise profusely for what you just said and beg for her help, noting the fact that the lighthouse is probably now on fire.
 
> Run back to the elevator and ride it back to, who I assume is, Jasmine. (If that doesn't work then try the stairs, though I doubt that'll work out too well. So may Tabiti have mercy on your soul if it comes to that, kid.) Curse her name for not warning you about the monster destroying the town (She can hear a pin drop from 6 feet above her, but not a town being set on fire?) Finally, apologise profusely for what you just said and beg for her help, noting the fact that the lighthouse is probably now on fire.

The monster is outside. The person who you know has personally killed a monster is inside. Deciding where you'd rather be isn't exactly tough.

You turn on your heel and take a step back towards the door. Unfortunately, a very large, very angry, and very alive one-clawed crab rears up in your path.

It clicks its mouthparts defiantly.

Oh, for God's sake. How exactly does the Narrator expect you to deal with this?

> Uh...can the MooMoo Milk restore that Quilava back to normal? If not, then maybe Vesta can talk to it. Vesta did came from that thing, right?

It might, it might not. You don't have much of it to waste, and even if you did, you're not sure you'd want to run the monumental risk of being eaten that comes with trying to feed a twelve-foot-long flaming death weasel.

Hey, isn't 'Flaming Death Weasel' a metal band? If not, you think in a rare moment of clarity in the midst of the adrenaline, it should be.

> Pray to Tabiti that you come out of this alive. Right now, have your Hideously Dangerous Stabby Thing out and hopefully some MooMoo Milk on hand. You'll probably need it. See if there is any way it might chase you into the water or find some other way to try to put the flames on the Eldritch monster in front of you out. Pray that Tabiti understands why you must harm the fire.
> First thought for the narrator 'Are you kidding me?!' Now that I got that out of my system back to the matter at hand,You may be too weak to fight this guy, Since your at the light house you're kind of cornered if your world geography is similar to game geography, First things first see if Vesta can communicate with the flames maybe get them to eat this thing. If that doesn't work see if there's even a slight chance of you and Vesta could survive jumping into the water.Right now pull out the poison stabby thing you made, If it comes down to it and he get's on top of you again or close enough you can hit him with it stab the crap out of his throat than kick him into the ocean. Good look man, we all knew this was coming I just thought we'd have a bit more time. If none of that works ask Tabiti for help you've done a lot to prove your devotion I think she could pull you from the flames once.

You turn away from the crab to see the Quilava stalking towards you, back rolling like a hunting stoat.

Screw this. You are out of here.

Uttering a brief prayer to Tabiti, you sprint straight past the Quilava and fling yourself off the edge of the cliff.

You have a full four seconds to regret this course of action before you hit the water – Long enough to realise that in the normal course of things, you couldn't possibly survive the fall.

You are very lucky that the Dreaming's been messing about with core mechanics.

The water fountains up around you in roaring plumes of foam; the shock tears through your feet and up through your legs with what feels like enough force to pulverise your pelvis – but you're not hurt, and you're thrusting the Hideously Dangerous Stabby Thing into your Bag and already striking out one-handed, clutching Vesta close with the other and hoping to God that the lid of her jar is watertight—

PLOOSH!

A wave rises up from behind and swamps you, dragging you under in an instant; gulping and flailing, half-drowned and wide-eyed despite the sting, you see for a moment the great crab, legs and blood trailing behind it as it sinks motionless into the deep—

—and then you break the surface again, spluttering and retching, and Vesta is screaming and the water glows green with the reflection of flames and you keep on swimming, swimming in any way that seems like it might take you away from the hell on the clifftop—

sssSHWA!

A green missile impacts on the waves just behind you, spreading out into a disc of hungry, clutching flames; they crawl over the water as if on slimy legs, crackling and cackling, and then dissipate with wails and shrieks as the next wave drops down and smothers them into oblivion.

sssSHWA!

Another, and as sparks lodge in your hair you duck under the water, their screams ringing in your ears as the sea devours them; it's strong, you think in a confused babble, it's strong and old and everything comes from the sea, eventually, it's where the old magic is strongest and no one can hold back its power...

sssSHWA! sssSHWA! sssSHWA!

The sea boils and the waves almost seem to howl back at the flames, and in the middle of the tempest, in the middle of the rain of fire and the seething waters you keep on swimming, grimly heading on to the west, to the shadow of the old dock, to where one of the concrete supports has broken down and might afford a perch for one slim Trainer and his small fire...

sssSHWA!

The flames hit a breaking wave and, impossibly, ricochet; a spray of emerald fire streaks up the cliff face and arcs down again to die a beautiful death in the sea. You risk a glance back and see the Quilava, staring down over the edge of the cliff, eye-pits bleeding with fury and... fear?

You stare back for a moment, and see it come right up to the edge, firing off another bolt of green fire as it does so – but it backs away, shaking its head and snuffling in agitation.

The Eldritch Quilava is actually afraid of something.

Your fingers hit hard concrete, and exultantly you haul yourself up onto the support beneath the dock, heart hammering, gasping for breath, and feeling more alive than you have in ages.

The Eldritch Quilava has a weakness.

You check Vesta, and are relieved to see she's fine; the rubber seal that once made the jar airtight has doubled as handy waterproofing. Your hands are, oddly, completely dry; the Adamantine Spider Silk appears to resist water like nothing else you've ever seen.

The Eldritch Quilava, scourge of Johto, your personal avenging demon, has a weakness.

You disgorge the last of the water with three huge, retching coughs, and almost immediately begin to laugh: you've done it. You're OK, and the Quilava... You look across at the mainland, and just beneath the edge of the dock above you can see it pacing back and forth in front of the lighthouse, fretting and fuming and flaming, and whining like a kicked dog.

You grin, feeling the water trickle down your cheeks. You're alive. You took a chance and you beat the damn demons and you're goddamnit you're alive.

You sit back against the remnants of the wooden pillar behind you, and close your eyes.

Right, you say to yourself, feeling your heart slowly slackening its pace inside you. Right. What now?
 
Set a trap that will somehow push the Quilava into the ocean. What? What are you looking at me for? I don't know how, I'm telling you what to do, not how to do it. If the Quilava gets back up, I suggest you drop it into the pit just outside of town.
 
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Check Vesta talk to her see how she's doing than do a bag check what do we have? Than see if there's a way to climb up onto the docks. Luckily it's still just a Quilava, I can't imagine what a Typhlosion would do. Right now let's focus on keeping you alive though a trap for that thing may work maybe you could trick it onto the dock and collapse it. (With you off the dock of course)

One more thing, a weird thought occurred to me, whenever a pc is spawned into this world a Lyra or Ethan Spawned with them, they're a static entity as they are spawn based on the player. Thus unlike the rest of the town wouldn't they have spawned with Othodox, with an already caught Eldritch Marill who's loyal to them? If that is true than I submit that if they traveled on the same or quicker Pace with a pokemon backing them up shouldn't said Lyra arrive in Olivine about the same time or a bit later than Othodox did? So around this time
 
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As the player gods said above me, checking Vesta is a must. Her safety, in some instances, has been proven to be more vital than your own. Also, do an Egg Check. Just to be sure that it's hatching time has not yet crept up on us.

My thoughts on a inventory check are also equivalent. Let's hope we have something useful. Hmm... perhaps the Portable Spratchery could be of some sort of use?

Knightfall signing off...
 
Check on Vesta and assure her that she will not be harmed by the water and that she's safe. For now, at least. Also, I agree with the inventory check. After we see what we're working with, we can go from there.
 
Since you seem to be safe for a while, look around and see if you can find some materials to make a raft or some-such. Cinnawood isn't going to just sail towards you. Alternatively: Build up your core with a brutal exercise routine/training montage and swim there like REAL MEN DO!
 
>Set a trap that will somehow push the Quilava into the ocean. What? What are you looking at me for? I don't know how, I'm telling you what to do, not how to do it. If the Quilava gets back up, I suggest you drop it into the pit just outside of town.

This is a wonderful plan. You lose yourself for a few minutes in pleasant thoughts of drowned flaming death weasels, and then entombed ones. That second one isn't so encouraging, though, as you're pretty sure Quilava can learn Dig, and as an Eldritch Pokémon it's highly unlikely to quibble about whether or not it has the TM. After all, those fireballs it was shooting at you were a very, very loose interpretation of Ember by anyone's standards.

>Comfort Vesta, make sure she is not scarred for life.

"Hey, Vesta," you say, holding up her jar. The spray crashes about your feet; you have to shout to be heard above it. "How're you holding up?"

She appears to be whistling the theme tune to Futurama. This raises a huge number of questions, none of which the Narrator has any desire to delve into now.

what?

"How are you holding up?" you repeat, more loudly.

holding up? vesta not up...

"It's an idiom," you explain with a sigh. "It means 'are you OK'?"

vesta fine, she replies, nonplussed. something wrong?

"Well, we're in the middle of the sea," you say. "Depends how much you like fish, I guess."

fish? sea?

Ah. That's why she isn't concerned – she has no idea what the sea is. Or, apparently, what fish are.

"Oh," you say. "Fish are like... like those eels, but shorter. Normally. Sometimes they're bigger, actually. You can eat them. Although some of them also eat you."

fish confusing, concludes Vesta. sea?

"Uh..." You elect not to tell Vesta that the sea is composed of several billion tonnes of anti-fire. "It's this thing we're sitting above," you said. "This big damp thing."

oh.

Vesta falls silent, presumably mulling this new information over – fish are an especially tricky concept for her, given the way you've explained them, and it'll probably take her a while.

Seriously, don't give up the day job. The teacher's life is not for you.

>Check Vesta talk to her see how she's doing than do a bag check what do we have? Than see if there's a way to climb up onto the docks. Luckily it's still just a Quilava, I can't imagine what a Typhlosion would do. Right now let's focus on keeping you alive though a trap for that thing may work maybe you could trick it onto the dock and collapse it. (With you off the dock of course)
One more thing, a weird thought occurred to me, whenever a pc is spawned into this world a Lyra or Ethan Spawned with them, they're a static entity as they are spawn based on the player. Thus unlike the rest of the town wouldn't they have spawned with Othodox, with an already caught Eldritch Marill who's loyal to them? If that is true than I submit that if they traveled on the same or quicker Pace with a pokemon backing them up shouldn't said Lyra arrive in Olivine about the same time or a bit later than Othodox did? So around this time
>As the player gods said above me, checking Vesta is a must. Her safety, in some instances, has been proven to be more vital than your own. Also, do an Egg Check. Just to be sure that it's hatching time has not yet crept up on us.
>My thoughts on a inventory check are also equivalent. Let's hope we have something useful. Hmm... perhaps the Portable Spratchery could be of some sort of use?
>Check on Vesta and assure her that she will not be harmed by the water and that she's safe. For now, at least. Also, I agree with the inventory check. After we see what we're working with, we can go from there.

Lyra. The mysterious person who somehow sent you a bloodstained email.

Who also happens to have a number registered in your Pokégear.

Well, who could resist?

It rings – and someone picks up.

"Hello?" you say.

"A smell of petroleum prevails throughout," says a strange, indistinct voice, and the line goes dead.

"Hello? Hello?"

Nothing. You call again, but there's no answer.

Hm. Now that was pretty weird. It might even have been a clue.

Inventory:

Adamantine Spider Silk x7
Badly Cracked Dangerous Makeshift Knife x1
Beauteous Ring x1
Berry x1
Bloodstained Mail x1
Bovine Horn x1
Boxed Wine x1
Bulging Wallet x1
Decayed Potion x1
Delicious Meat Bits x2
Elm's Key x1
Flowery Wreath x1
Glass Shards x5
Green Apricorn x1
Half a Cup of Cold Coffee x1
Hideously Dangerous Stabby Thing x1
Hyper Potion x2
Jar of Sentient Fire x1
Large European Eel x4
Lava Cookie x7
Lithium Batteries x4
Loaded Portable Spratchery (Two Shots) x1
Machine for Predicting the Number of Pips in an Unopened Orange x1
Machine Pistol Magazine x6
Miracle Seed x1
MooMoo Milk x2
My First Tri-Beam Laser GunTM x1
Mysterious Note x1
Novelty Giraffe Shoe x1
Paper-Wrapped Eel Half x1
Poké Ball x1
Potion x2
Powerless Tablet Computer x1
Rare Bone x1
Revive x1
Rocks x12
Sealed Box of Dustox Powder x1
Shiny Stone x1
Splintery Planks x5
Stale Baguette x1
Super Potion x5
TM23 Iron Tail x7
Togepi Egg Shard x3
Weird Shrivelled Thing x1
Wrecked Stylish Dress x1

While you're doing this, you check the Bad Egg. Holding it up, you see the s3a behind it wiggling and twisting like w0rms.

The Egg Watch: It appears to move occasionally. It may be close to hatching.

Hey, that's an improvement! Not much of one, admittedly, but it's still an improvement.

One of the voices appears to be urging you to go up onto the dock, but you'd rather wait until there's some sort of consensus among the voices. After all, the rest are urging caution, and caution definitely seems to have yielded good results so far during this adventure.

> Since you seem to be safe for a while, look around and see if you can find some materials to make a raft or some-such. Cinnawood isn't going to just sail towards you. Alternatively: Build up your core with a brutal exercise routine/training montage and swim there like REAL MEN DO!

You have a sudden and disturbing vision of yourself running through the snow and splashing through semi-frozen lakes while a disturbingly muscular Eldritch Quilava works out in some kind of mad scientist's lair to a backdrop of blinking lights and dry ice.

Thankfully, that fades, but you're pretty sure that the ten square inches you've got to work with here aren't enough space for either of those approaches.

As for building materials, there's a huge wooden dock above you, but you're leaning against one of only three or four things holding it up. You don't dare remove any parts of it to try and build into a raft. Or even a 'some-such'.

Sorry about the delays recently. It's the last week of a major art project, the one on which my overall grade for this year rests, and I really haven't had much time to write. However, with me now being only half a form away from being totally finished, I'm back in full swing again!
 
Okay looked up the words ( /Title) It is the apparent secret of the universe multiple people have written down under the influence of hallucinogenics. So either it could be a red herring, maybe your whole word is a drag addled hallucination and your slowly learning the secret of the universe or it's a broader hint than I thought and I need to give it more thought :P.

Anyway try using the Spatchery at the Quilava see what it does to it. If it does something bad do it again, and if it does something good use it on yourself and vesta
 
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I honestly do not know what you should do. I would suggest making a raft but the thought of an entire ocean of Eldritch sea Pokemon terrifies me, not even to mention the city at the bottom. Freaking R'lyeh and Cthulu and all that. It's scary. And why would the Dreaming even affect Pokemon? I say take the time you have right now in relative safety to sit and think. Why do you have such a bizarre repertoire of information? Isnt it a little convenient you know so much about fish and the ocean and stuff and the creepy things that screwed up the Pokemon world are ocean-based? Take some time to ponder your situation.
 
Come to think of it, doesn't the Spatchery resemble a pistol of some kind? I know it's a long-shot, but why don't you try loading 'er up with some of those bullets?
 
> Come to think of it, doesn't the Spatchery resemble a pistol of some kind? I know it's a long-shot, but why don't you try loading 'er up with some of those bullets?

If by 'pistol' you mean 'eighteenth-century artillery piece', then yes. Yes it does.

You put a cartridge designed for a revolver into one of the barrels of the Spratchery. It sits there, small as a gnat in a cathedral.

Nope. No way in hell that thing's going to fire.

> Okay looked up the words ( /Title) It is the apparent secret of the universe multiple people have written down under the influence of hallucinogenics. So either it could be a red herring, maybe your whole word is a drag addled hallucination and your slowly learning the secret of the universe or it's a broader hint than I thought and I need to give it more thought.
Anyway try using the Spatchery at the Quilava see what it does to it. If it does something bad do it again, and if it does something good use it on yourself and vesta

You can't really get a good shot at the Quilava from here – and you don't want to, anyway. You're pretty sure that firing the Spratchery will just send half a kilo of small fish flying through the air to be flash-cooked in the Quilava's back-flames.

Why the Narrator ever gave you this thing is entirely beyond you.

> I honestly do not know what you should do. I would suggest making a raft but the thought of an entire ocean of Eldritch sea Pokemon terrifies me, not even to mention the city at the bottom. Freaking R'lyeh and Cthulu and all that. It's scary. And why would the Dreaming even affect Pokemon? I say take the time you have right now in relative safety to sit and think. Why do you have such a bizarre repertoire of information? Isnt it a little convenient you know so much about fish and the ocean and stuff and the creepy things that screwed up the Pokemon world are ocean-based? Take some time to ponder your situation.

Yes.

It's very convenient. You could argue that you know all that because you're the Chosen One, the player character. You could argue that you know it because it was hard-coded into you at creation, just like that vague backstory was. You could even argue that you know it for reasons of narrative imperative, because let's face it no one wants to send you running around Johto looking for a library to look up species of eel.

Actually, where the hell are all the libraries in Johto? And the hospitals? And the schools? Christ, what the hell kind of country were they running before the Dreaming happened?

You rein yourself in; you're too tired to question reality right now. The sun is dipping in the sky, and the light is growing dimmer and redder; there'll be time enough for philosophy and action after you've had a sleep. Right now, you've just got enough energy to ponder, and hopefully to climb up onto the dock somehow so you can find somewhere to sleep.

Right, then. Pondering.

Why do you know all this stuff? There really only seems to be one answer: because someone wants you to. Whatever entity spawned you in New Bark spawned you with this information in your head. Therefore they wanted you to know it. Were they preparing you for what was to come? Quite possibly. That may be why certain information seems to unlock at certain points in your adventure – like scripted encounters, but in your head.

Wait, are your thoughts even making sense any more? You're not so sure they are. Is it you, or is it – actually, you realise in a moment of clarity, you're sitting on a soaking wet lump of concrete sticking out of a wind-tossed sea wearing a shredded, drenched evening dress that didn't cover much to begin with. That difficulty you're experiencing in thinking coherently is probably the onset of hypothermia.

Damn. You're really not a fan of this new realism module the Dreaming seems to have introduced.
 
Let's climb out of the dock somethings keeping Quilava from coming over here so it seems safe for the moment and try to slip into the dock building or a house without Quilava noticing or noticing if it's a stone building with a lockable door. Make a small fire, and use the spatchery to flash cook some fish to eat, than dry your dress while you sleep. Also I think we should turn the dress into a robe.
 
Oh god I forgot we were still wearing the dress. You need to get out of that. See if its at all possible to use anything in your bag to make better clothing. If the Eldritch Spinarak silk isnt all being used for gloves, see if you can make something out of it. Not only will you be better protected from the Quilava, but if it is good at keeping out heat, maybe it'll keep you warmer than a torn dress.
 
> Let's climb out of the dock somethings keeping Quilava from coming over here so it seems safe for the moment and try to slip into the dock building or a house without Quilava noticing or noticing if it's a stone building with a lockable door. Make a small fire, and use the spatchery to flash cook some fish to eat, than dry your dress while you sleep. Also I think we should turn the dress into a robe.

You look up. A foot or so above your head, the wooden leg terminates in a splintery mess; above that, there's a good six or seven feet of empty space, and then a ragged hole in the surface of the dock. You might just be able to squeeze through.

Well, it's not like you have a choice. There's no room to get changed here, and you have to move anyway or face a rather unpleasant death by exposure. Onwards and upwards, then!

You pull your legs up stiffly onto the concrete, then stand up, keeping one hand on the wooden post for balance. It seems sturdy enough; you're probably going to be able to stand on it. You stuff Vesta into your Bag and try to drag yourself up onto the stump, moving gingerly for fear of splinters – and then you remember the Adamantine Spider Silk wrapped around your hands, and move more assertively, safe in the knowledge that nothing is going to slice your fingers through that.

It isn't easy. You try to grip the sides of the pole with your legs, but your knees are wet and the wood slippery with brine and mould; you try and get your feet wedged into some of the notches on its sides, but they won't fit. You step back a moment, thinking, then unwrap your Novelty Giraffe Shoe (which is falling apart anyway) from your foot and hurl it into the sea; your other shoe and sock, both of which are equally ruined, follow suit.

You attempt the climb again. This time, your toes curl into the weathered gnarls of the wood, and slowly, painfully, every movement sending little starbursts of agony through your frozen arms, you pull yourself upwards. Foot up a little higher – there – reach forwards – and now—

You fall forwards onto the top of the pole, belly first; your breath is knocked clean out of you – and replaced, if the pain in your abdomen is anything to go by, with approximately fifteen billion splinters.

But hey! At least you're up here, right? Better than nothing.

For about half a minute, you lie draped over the pole as if on a skewer, and then a leaden heaviness descends on you, and you're pretty sure you can't move at all anyway, and now...

No! You blink fiercely and bite your tongue in a desperate effort to rouse yourself; the former is decidedly ineffective, but the latter sends a sharp lance of pain through your head and clears your mind a little. Get up, you think. Get up, Othodox...

You pull you knees up beneath you, hardly caring about the pain in your legs as the splintered wood scrapes across the bare flesh; now you're getting up, somehow, you're on a square foot of wood a few metres above a tempestuous ocean and somehow you're getting to your feet, you'd think your balance wouldn't be up to that but then again you were made for this, made to survive and fight and win, because you're the player character...

You open your eyes. You're kneeling atop the pole, bleeding and frozen, head slumped forwards.

Looks like you blacked out halfway through getting up. You need to be careful, you tell yourself; you can't risk falling unconscious, not here, not when the slightest mistake means falling into the sea from which you know you have no hope of extricating yourself.

You take a deep breath, and bite your lip, hard enough to draw blood. Salt and iron and your old friend pain mingle on your tongue, and for a moment your mind is clear. Clear enough to realise that if you don't get up right now, you're going to die – and that means Vesta will die, and Falkner, and the poor creature that you've started to think of as Jasmine will probably die as well of heartbreak when you fail to come back.

So.

Get up, Othodox.

It's like a mantra: you repeat it, over and over, the words throbbing in your head, unable to escape your frozen lips but washing and rebounding over the walls of your skull like the waves on the concrete below.

Get up, Othodox.

One knee up, close to your chin. You can see the blood and bits of wood sticking out, but they're minor injuries; they hurt, but it just keeps you focused, that's all, just pain keeping you focused, not getting in the way of your movement.

Get up, Othodox.

Balance perfect. Rising upwards, leg straightening, other leg coming out below you, and Christ you're wobbling—

Get up, Othodox.

Wildly windmilling your arms, eyes wide and mouth open in soundless fear – but it's fine, it's OK, you got your balance back and now you're standing up, balanced on the pole like a statue on a column.

Get up, Othodox.

Looking up, reaching out; fingers on the ragged edges of the hole, gripping, tugging; it doesn't give way, seems like it will be strong enough – and you heave, and feel your feet leaving the wood.

Get up, Othodox.

You fall back down, arms suddenly weak, and if you hadn't been holding onto the wood above you'd have lost your balance and fallen into the sea. Too much, too soon – and yet you can't wait, you have to get up there, and you tighten your grip and grimly bunch your muscles.

Get up, Othodox.

Head through the gap – shoulders burning – elbow out over the dock, hooking onto the remnants of a wooden railing—

Up.

And there you are.

Lying full length on the dock, gasping for breath, half-dead with the cold and the wet and the effort, bloody sunset light across your back – and it feels good, feels so good to be up here at last where you can stretch out, but you know you can't yet stop and you climb stiffly to your feet, the odd heavy warmth of your limbs making every step a chore, and you stumble over to the old ticket office, just about avoiding the rotten planks that snap like straws at your approach, and blunder through the gap where the door used to be—

You lose your footing again because of the tilted floor – the entire building has sunk on one side, leaving it at a seventy-degree angle to the norm – and roll helplessly down into a puddle of water at the bottom. It should be cold, but it feels warm, and though you try to be scared you just can't quite manage it. You look up towards the ticket desk – still there, bolted to the floor; if you could just climb up to it, you could sit on its side, which now faces upwards, and be safe. But it's so far away, so very far away, and you're not sure you can climb the twenty feet across the floor...

You reach out with one hand and grab a fold in the mildewed carpet; it tears in your hand, leaving a neat hole in the fabric beneath, a hole that could take a hand or a dextrous foot, and, every muscle in your body having been replaced by warm rags, you can only surmise that your climb is fuelled entirely by willpower. Inch by slow inch, you ascend, the desk swelling in your sight, and then you are dragging yourself over the plastic rim and sinking onto an honest-to-God dry surface, in the crook of the desk where it meets the floor, and with a weak sigh of exultation you close your eyes...

> Oh god I forgot we were still wearing the dress. You need to get out of that. See if its at all possible to use anything in your bag to make better clothing. If the Eldritch Spinarak silk isnt all being used for gloves, see if you can make something out of it. Not only will you be better protected from the Quilava, but if it is good at keeping out heat, maybe it'll keep you warmer than a torn dress.

No.

Not yet.

You force them open again – with your fingers, as it happens; your eyelids no longer obey you. You reach for your Bag; fumble with the straps, pull out the remaining Adamantine Spider Silk. Little of your dress remains after your abrasive journey across the wood and carpet, but with a Herculean effort, you manage to flick the bigger fragments away from you. Then you draw the sheet of silk that once enshrouded the Eldritch Spinarak close around you, and give in to sleep.

---

Beneath you, the Deep Ones are marching.

They flop and flap and paddle their way through the streets of that Cyclopean city, looking like grotesque dwarves in a citadel of giants, and above them you keep pace, drifting along level with the rooftops; where you are headed you don't know, but you can see now that this is not the Deep Ones' native home. The proportions are all wrong; the buildings here are made for creatures of frighteningly prodigious size – creatures that are surely too large to exist according to all the laws of biology – and the Deep Ones are only a little more than man-sized.

Why are they here, you wonder distantly. What has brought them to this place?

You follow them through the streets, and hear the strange piping of unnameable instruments rising from the crowds below; there is a sense of occasion about the whole thing, you realise, a kind of majesty that lends even this terrible procession a faint ring of respectability.

The streets are rising.

You barely notice it at first, but it soon becomes undeniable: the city is here built on some vast hill or mountain, and the buildings themselves are getting taller, crowned with towers topped with tentacular finials; the Deep Ones are moving faster now, too, as if eager to reach the summit.

Finally, it occurs to you to look ahead, and now you see it: a single tower at the apex of the hill, rising up and up and up apparently without end, rising up so high its top fades into obscurity among the black waters above, and suddenly you know that the top of this tower sees daylight still, and that on its topmost floor is a great door that must never, ever be opened—

---

It's sunny.

You wake, blinking and exhausted, to find sunlight streaming through the broken windows of the old ticket office. It takes you a moment to remember why you're here, and a further moment to realise you're not dead.

You'd love to celebrate this, but you can't really move right now.

The Adamantine Spider Silk has trapped your body heat amazingly well, and you're snug as you can be within your cocoon – dry, too, which is fantastic. You lie there for a while, basking drowsily in a sense of relief and happiness, and then reach cautiously out of your silken bed for your Bag. If you're not mistaken, you put your regular clothes somewhere in there when you first donned the dress.

You are not mistaken, and in fact are soon dressed once more in jeans, T-shirt and jacket – though your shoes, socks and Flowery Wreath are all, regrettably, things of the past. You pull a few lingering splinters from various portions of your anatomy, and check your belly and legs for any wounds that require attention – and, thankfully, find none, just cuts and bruises.

You consider lighting a fire, but since the entire office and dock is made of wood, you think it might be a bad idea, and eat the remaining half of your cooked eel instead of trying out the Spratchery.
 
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