volieredeatori | Ancient Future (working title)

There were too many people in the Seabed Relics. Sera could almost feel her chances of finding anything interesting spiraling right down the figurative drain.

They were loud, too; their chatter, ceaseless and irritating, pierced right into her ears, and no matter which way she turned she couldn't seem to get away from it. She kept her disgust carefully hidden, however, her movements firmly controlled as she circled the perimeter of the outer room with slow steps that made her seem as though she was merely drifting aimlessly, finally pausing again near the door to let her shoulders sag and rub her face as if exhausted. Well, no, it wasn't really a lie - she was exhausted, physically and mentally, and for a moment she considered just walking out. It wasn't as if she had any real obligation to be here. The only person she worked for, after all, was herself.

She was just eyeing the door and gauging how quickly she could slip out without being noticed when a cold metal hand landed on her shoulder, and she couldn't stop herself from letting out a gasp and stumbling away from the touch.

The large male CAST that the hand belonged to barked out a laugh, peering at her quizzically. "Jumpy, are we? Hah. Can't say I blame you." His echoing voice cut sharp across the air, and it was all Sera could do not to wince; instead, she folded her arms and pasted on the most bored expression she possibly could, not really paying attention to the flood of talk that spilled out of his synthetic mouth. Something about some big hotshot sponsor, lots of money, how impressed (she wanted to laugh when that sank in, but bit her tongue) he apparently was that she was going it alone, that sort of thing. Needless words just to fill some imagined gap of silence, idiotic conversation that she wanted no part of, and she'd almost succeeded in tuning him completely out when something suddenly cut across the field of her concentration and she started - a young female voice, high and scared, begging to just leave already and get out of this awful place.

She trembled briefly for some reason she couldn't quite name, and her eyes narrowed.

The CAST had noticed, too. "This is no place for children. And I'll wager she's no mercenary."

"Do you just get pleasure out of stating the obvious? Get out of my way," Sera cut in finally, her tone carefully neutral yet just barbed enough to sting, and brushed past the armored figure for a closer look.

The owner of the voice was a small, slender girl dressed in red, blonde hair half-ponytailed atop her head and the rest falling in a slight messy bob around her face; she resembled nothing so much as some spoiled child, really, especially with how she trembled with nervous fear as she helplessly flailed and pleaded with the man she was with - presumably her guardian. "This is a relic site! A relic site - did you hear me?! Come on, you can't make me stay here!"

The man looked displeased, jabbing a finger in her direction and speaking in a tone full of disgust. Even under the hair that fell haphazardly over his eyes, it was obvious he was glaring. "Remind me why I pay you?"

The girl flinched back and slumped, and Sera almost considered breaking into the conversation, but then firmly reminded herself it was none of her business. Besides, she didn't even like kids.

"Look, it's safe here. I'll go find some work for you to do." The man gestured in agitation, his tone half patronizing and half resigned. "Just don't wander off. You hear me? Stay put." He didn't even wait for an answer, simply turning and walking away and ignoring the way the girl stumbled after him for a few steps before giving in and obeying, slouching into a disappointed and frightened little heap where she stood and looking around her with wary eyes. She was clearly frightened out of her wits, way out of her figurative depth, and for a few long moments, Sera really had to wonder what could make anyone think it was a good idea to bring someone so obviously wet behind the ears into an unexplored, potentially dangerous place like this. Really, the way some people's minds worked just didn't seem logical at all.

She might have pondered on it further, but suddenly a high-pitched feedback whine seared across her mind, and she found herself frozen in place from the pain of it, her eyes watering and her hands curling into tight fists; she could hardly notice, but dimly, she realized that she wasn't the only one affected, that the girl had fallen to her knees and was clutching at her head with frightened, agonized sounds.

But why-- a single coherent thought made it through the pain, the realization that they were the only two so affected sinking in. Why doesn't anyone else notice this sound?

Then, all of a sudden, the relics trembled, and the sound ceased to be.

It took Sera a few moments to get her wits back about her, and by that time, those assembled were fleeing, running as fast as they could for the outside. "Everyone! Out of the chamber!" someone was shouting over the hubbub, waving frantically, beckoning people towards the doors that were beginning to slowly grind closed; she dimly knew she should follow, but her legs wouldn't listen to her, and she could only stumble a few steps and then collapse herself as the yelling continued. "Move it, move it! Hurry, the doors are closing!"

Come on, Sera. Get up, get out of here... She struggled to her feet, stumbled again, and helplessly watched the doors picking up speed, shaking her head. No, it wasn't even worth trying. She wouldn't make it even if she thought her legs could support her properly right now. She had to envy the girl; at least she had the guts to try and run for it, even when the doors were clearly about to close right in her face.

The two heavy slabs met with a muted rumbling thunk, and then, for a few precious seconds, a deep, almost-frightening silence reigned.

Sera rubbed a hand over her face, looking disgustedly down at her legs as the feeling returned to them about a minute and a half too late, and shook her head. "Nothing I can do, I guess," she sighed softly to herself, and closed her eyes for a long moment, visualizing the familiar shapes of her weapons and relaxing when her right arm was weighted suddenly down by her trademark photon claw. "I guess I'll just have to go farther in and find a way out from there. At least I don't have to deal with all those idiots who managed to get through..."

A hollow, rhythmic banging began to echo through the chamber, the girl beating helplessly on the doors and yelling for someone to let her out, and Sera flinched despite herself, rubbing her face again with her unarmed hand. Maybe she wouldn't have to deal with the idiots, but well...dealing with a child wasn't much better.

Still, she supposed she had no choice. "Hey," she called sharply, raising her voice, and crossed the grit-covered floor in several quick strides, pretending not to notice how the girl jumped and whirled to face her with an expression somewhere between angered and terrified. "No one's left to hear you, you know. They're all too busy trying to save their own useless skins."

"You've gotta be kidding me! How the heck am I supposed to get out of here?!" Anger won out over fear for the moment, and the girl turned sharply about, uselessly pounding against the solidly-locked doors with trembling hands. "Come on, there's someone out there! Right? Right...?"

"Quiet." Sera paused beside the girl, shooting her a sharp look that made her cringe and obediently fall silent, and leaned up to the door, laying one ear gently against the surface to listen. Nothing, as she'd expected. "No one's out there. This door isn't opening for love or money. Look, maybe there's a way out deeper inside, and even if you don't want to find it, I'm going." She didn't bother waiting for an answer, simply turned on her heel and started across the room, letting her claw swing conspicuously at her side. She knew these types, all she had to do was wait, get a good distance away, and...

Quick footsteps echoed behind her, and she had just enough time to brace herself before a warm weight barreled into her, shaking hands wrapping themselves tightly about her arm. "Hey, wait! I - I, um - please, take me with you! Please! I want to get out of here, I don't like it here at all..."

"Get off me." Sera's words were a bit harsher than she'd intended, and she let the faintest flicker of an apologetic look cross her face as she turned her head to look at the girl, the hands slowly falling away. "I don't know," she went on, calling up her most flippant tone and tilting her head vaguely to the side, "that's probably not such a good idea. I mean, look at you. You're so scared your knees are knocking and you can hardly even walk - I doubt you'd even make it ten steps. You should just wait here for someone to come rescue you."

Shock flashed across the girl's eyes, but then it was followed by an upwelling of fury, her fists clenching tight as she drew herself up into the straightest posture she could. "Hey, come on! Look, I may not look it, but I'm not totally helpless, all right?! I've got weapons, there's no way I'd come into someplace like this unarmed, and...and well, if it's the only way to get out of here, then whether I'm scared or not, I've gotta do it! So I'm begging you - please, take me with you, please!"

Sera's lips quirked into a brief smile. Good. She'd judged correctly. "That's more like it. Don't lose that attitude." She extended her bare hand. "I'm Sera Cecille."

"Emilia...Emilia Percival." The girl, just looking outright stunned now at the sudden realization that Sera had played her like an instrument to pluck up her courage to acceptable levels, took the hand as if in a daze and gave it a trembling shake. "...So I guess now's not the time to tell you that even if I have weapons, I've never actually been in a real fight before?"

"Nope." Sera's smile turned into a wolfish grin. "You ready to move out?"

Emilia sighed heavily and slouched, her ponytail flopping forward in resignation. "Honestly? No."

"But you'll move out anyway?" Sera finished for her with a rare spike of amusement, and was rewarded with a nervous little 'heh' sound and a nod from her new partner as the two of them started for the door that would lead them deeper into the relics.

There was a bit of a pattern, she'd come to realize over the years, to sites like this. No matter how much they differed in design, layout or contents, there were the things that never changed: they were always stifling, far too expansive for comfort, and jam-packed with monsters, and of course this one was no different - it didn't even take them five steps into the next room to be set upon by a pack of sharklike creatures with bladed arms, and though she had no doubts about her own ability, Sera found herself hesitating and falling back more than she'd really have liked just to make sure she was staying close to Emilia. This was exactly why she hated working in teams, especially with untrained rookies; more often than not, she ended up covering their asses as well as her own, and it took twice as long to get anything done.

Sure, okay, after the initial stab of panic, Emilia seemed to have figured out at least the bare basics of what she was doing and wasn't doing half-bad at beating the creatures back, but Sera remained firmly convinced for the moment that the girl was more of a hindrance than a help. She was almost tempted to grumble a few choice words, and as she rammed the prongs of her claw right into a tough, reptilian head, she was just about to do exactly that when suddenly Emilia's voice rang out in a shrill, panicked cry. "Sera, don't move! There's one right behind you!"

There's what? Sera whirled without thinking, only to get a blast of smoke and fire right in the face, coughing and gagging as she was forced to wave the pungent stench of roasted monster away from her face.

However distracted she might have been to let that thing sneak up on her, though, it didn't extend to her instinctive ability to assess the situation, and she abruptly realized there was something extremely odd about what had just happened. It wasn't that Emilia had called a warning, or even that she'd taken out that monster in a split-second reaction time rivaling Sera's own, but...that fireball hadn't come from behind the monster.

It had come from in front of Sera, where Emilia was standing only a few feet away, looking somewhere between horrified and irritated. "I told you not to move! I could have hit you!"

"Are--" Sera took a breath of odorous air, choked and coughed into the crook of her elbow for a few long moments, her eyes watering by the time she could calm. "Are you kidding me?" The angle that fireball must have come from, not only to flare right past her even if she moved (and certainly that had to have been taken into account, for she wasn't even singed) but to also strike right into the monster's weakest point...that was a feat of split-second calculation even she, with all her years of training, would feel nervous about performing. "Where the hell did you learn to aim like that? I don't believe it."

"What did you expect me to do, leave you as monster bait? No way! There's no way I can get out of here by myself!" Emilia's hands fisted tightly around her weapon, then loosened as she gave Sera a sudden puzzled look. "And what do you mean, where did I learn to aim like that? It's not like there was anything special about it."

Sera stared at her, then took a deep breath and turned away. Didn't she have any idea of the extremely difficult feat she'd just pulled off? "...No. Never mind. Let's just keep going, it's going to get even harder from here on out."

"Oh, great," Emilia moaned, but followed her nonetheless.

Things progressed much the same from there on out, and by the time they'd made it to the innermost chamber, Sera had to admit it might have been a better decision than she'd initially realized to bring Emilia along with her. Even untrained, the girl had obvious talent, and without her admittedly impressive analytical prowess, it would have been a hell of a lot more tedious and painful to even make it half this far. She's no mercenary, that's for sure, but...there's something strange about her. I don't doubt that she's never had any field experience, but the way she handles herself in battle, and the things she's pointed out along the way...you'd think she's been doing this for years. I don't get it, I've heard of natural talent but this is just...

Shaking her head roughly and twisting to flick some strange gunky substance off the points of her claw, she looked around and frowned a little, shoulders tensing. This was definitely as far in as they could go; large recesses in the walls held strange stone and metal figures with menacingly large weapons, giving the impression that they would come to life at any moment and rain down disappointed judgment on any foolish enough to intrude on their resting place, and she found herself taking a few protective steps closer to Emilia as she tried to convince herself they weren't going to do just that. "Stateria," she breathed out, hardly even daring to speak, sweeping the room quickly with an almost-nervous gaze and shuddering briefly. "This has got to be the central room, but I don't see a way out. Maybe there's something we missed. You didn't see anything along the way, did you, Emilia?"

Emilia jumped, obviously not expecting to be addressed, but responded immediately, her own voice no more than a faint breath as well. "No - nothing. I don't see anything in here either, but I...I can't help but get the feeling that they're watching us..."

"That makes two of us." Sera felt a swirl of relief, beginning to move slowly back towards the outside corridor, Emilia following after her with a white-knuckled grip on the rod she held. "We've been in here too long, we're probably getting claustrophobic and paranoid. Still, I'm all for getting away from these suckers." Their circuit of the room had brought them now back to the door, and she finally dared to turn her back on the Stateria, not wanting to risk backing out into the hallway and running right into any monsters that might be lurking in wait. "Guess we'll just have to make another sweep of the place, as much as I hate to say it. Come on, the faster we get it over with..."

She was interrupted by a horrible grating, screeching sound and a scream, and whirled wide-eyed to find Emilia frozen in fear, staring helplessly up at the raised, clawed hand of a very angry, very large, very wide-awake Stateria.

"Get out of the way!" She didn't even think - she simply lunged, using her own weight and momentum to throw Emilia aside, and there wasn't even time for fear to set in before the hand came down and a burst of brilliant crimson blotted out her vision, unbearable pain lancing through every nerve for the single split second before all feeling suddenly faded away.

The last thing she was aware of was a brilliant golden light.