I'll warn your family

"You should warn the elders, they sound harder to convince," you recall their disbelief that {s} could hear you blowing the horn.

She seemed **** at the whole idea.

"I'll warn your family, don't worry." You tried to reassure her.

"Can you give me the directions to where they live?"

She gives you the directions via alleys and side-roads just incase {T} decides to set up an ambush along the main roads.

"Stay safe {s}," you wish her luck.

She hugs you, pulling you into her with a sudden passion, "Don't you dare die on me, Daniel."

You close your eyes and embrace her in return. "I'll do my best, and {s}?"

Her serious expression wavers and she releases, looking up at you with watery eyes.

"Don't die on me either, I.." you want to say you love her but you're not sure that's appropriate, given how recently you've met.

"..I still need to pay you back for saving my life."

She grins at this.

"Well..we should probably go, the sooner the better." You reluctantly begin puting your boots on.

"If he's true to his word then he'll likely lie in wait until we return...we should meet elsewhere once we notify the people." She gives you directions to a secluded location.

"If there's any trouble, like last time, blow the horn again, I'll do my best to get there as fast as possible."

"I will, and {s}?"

She turns to face you one last time.

You couldn't help yourself, "In case we don't see eachother again, for whatever reason, I love you."

She runs into you and kisses you, hugging you tight.

"Godspeed! I love you too."

Then she turns and runs out the door, you thought you made out a blush between the stands of her hair as she left.

God you hope she makes it, with or without the antidote.

...

Drip

Drip drop

Drip drop drip dripropipop

The familiar sounds of the people conversing and generally mingling were absent from the normally crowded streets...a storm was coming by the looks of the clouds above you and the rain had just begun.

You weren't exactly dressed for the weather but that's probably the least of your problems, being poisoned and all.

Everything turns bright for a split second, then a crash sounds across the land, the first flash of lightning and crash of thunder.

You start thinking about {s} but stop yourself soon after, you'll be no good to her dead, and unless you pay attention there's a good chance you'll have company where you're going. You hope that lion knows what it's doing though...

Alley to alley, tent block to tent block, you continue making your way to where she said her parents lived.

Kabangcshhhh

More lightning and thunder, you wonder what it feels like to have such electricity rush through your veins.

You see a few hooded figures crouched down in a tent and recognize the guy with the bandana you had met earlier.

"HEY!" You call out against the rain, hoping he could hear if not see you, it was starting to pour down.

"Daniel? IS THAT YOU?" He calls out.

You approach, sitting your soaked bottom in the dirt next to him.

CRASHCSHCK

Another bolt of thunder.

"You saved my life! I owe you my thanks," You don't have to shout at this proximity.

"Of course! It's good to see you up again Daniel, I-" CRSHACKSHH "-I heard you got caught by the Wing's Wrath after you ran from those guys, {s} told me the whole story while you were recovering. I have to ask though, what are you doing getting yourself soaked like that?"

"I came here because..well, I guess you could say I'm meeting with ****. I got involved with this guy {T}...turns out he's willing to go to great ends to see his orders followed, he poisoned me."

He shakes his head, "I'm sorry to hear that. {T} is a dangerous man...Does {s} know about this?"

"She does...-" CRASHCKSHCKASCKSH "-how do you know {T}?"

"He was interfering with something a few days ago by the sound of it...the council seemed outraged at this..hey, who did you say you were having a meeting with?" Brayden asks.

"Well, ****, I meant that in the metaphorical sense though. I'm trying to warn {s}'s parents before it's too late, {T} threatened to kill them too..-"

"Wait wait wait, you're saying **** is to meet you?" He seems surprised at this.

"Well, yeah, I suppose so."

He shakes his head with a smile and pulls out a card, with distinctive rips that read 'yours'.

"****. The name of the card. I'll explain later, where did you say you were going again?"

He motions that his friend bring a coat over and you put it on.

"{s}'s parents, they're in danger. How did you-"

CRSHCK

"Later, you say you've got very little time. Lead the way, we will follow you."

You nod, "thank you."

...

"It's unusual." Brayden says when you've been walking for a while.

"What?"

"The rain, It's very unusual that we get a storm like this..let alone any rain."

You did notice the tents looked under prepared for the downpour.

You notice he has a grim expression.

Then you see it, the house {s} had described. It was different, mainly because it wasn't a tent. It seemed most of the population lived in simple tent dwellings while an upper elite live in proper housing.

"We'll defend the house, cover all the entrances. You go inside, talk to {s}'s parents, be quick, then we'll move on."

You nod, "Thanks ag-"

"Go!!" He urges impatiently.

You smile, you have a feeling {s} would get along with him if she ever had the chance to meet him.

You knock at the door a few times.

Nothing.

"Brayden are you sure this is-"

Brayden sprints past you, up the steps and into the door with as much **** as he can conjure, the door doesn't stand a chance.

CRACK crash

"We don't have time for formalities when you've been poisoned." He states, standing on the door he just kicked down. You would be lying to yourself if you thought otherwise, Brayden seems like a badass.

You look around the house, it looks..empty. Brayden and his friends enter in after you, checking all the rooms.

"They aren't here..why aren't they here? I know them, they don't usually leave their home unless they have to, certainly not during a rainstorm..." Brayden mumbles as he paces from room to room.

You're about to suggest going to {s}'s secret meeting spot instead when you hear the slightest sound.

Thump

Nobody else notices it, so you stand still and press a finger to your lips, hopefully this dimension's inhabitants understand that signal.

They appear to, standing still and keeping silent...

You look around and listen..it sounds like it was noth-

Thump.

Brayden's eyes go wide, and they begin looking all over the place for any trace of where they might be, flipping bookshelves and tables and even the bed over. And that's when you lift a rug and find it a trapdoor.

The simple door looks quite unassuming, and even if you'd moved the rug it's very possible you wouldn't have noticed if not for the rythmic thumping coming from the floor.

You lift the door and find an already lot lamp hanging from the wall of a corridor leading straight down into darkness, a ladder offering transportation to and from the bottom by the looks of it. Trying to make out what's at the bottom, you can't see all the way down, but the thumping is louder now that the trapdoor is open so you know it's coming from down there somewhere.

You're about to head down when Brayden stops you. "I'll go first."

"I'm the one who's poisoned, I'm probably going to die anyway." you protest.

He turns to you and says, "You are courageous, Daniel. You move despite fear, even when you have something to live for. I do not fear as you do, I am not a hero, I only recognize my destiny, and my own will to fulfill it. When I found this card..-" he fishes it out of his pocket to show you again. "-..I didn't know what it meant. I thought someone had probably dropped it, I had no clue why it's rips read 'yours'. I brought it to the fortune teller, perhaps she could interpret it's meaning. She told me 'What does it say?' I paused, wondering for a moment if she was blind. So I say what I think it says, 'yours'. She gives me a weird kind of smile and says, 'Who do you think it belongs to if it says it's yours?'. I didn't know how to answer that, and I nearly threw it away right then in there, but I didn't. And now I'm glad I chose to keep it..."

You're astonished. "You think she knew we were going to meet?"

He shrugs, "How else do you explain the card? I guess you could have coincidentally said 'I'm off to see ****'..."

You gulp and avert your gaze, he notices.

He smiles and shakes his head. "She gave you this card didn't she?" As he waves your card in front of you.

You can only nod.

He takes your hand, "Never give up Daniel. Follow your heart, and you will not die today. There's a reason this is happening, I don't yet know why. But I know we were meant to meet, and this was all meant to happen. If I'm the one who ended up with a card named '****'..." His voice trails off.

"I'm going first into any creepy tunnels we happen to come across. Clearly I'm meant to keep you safe, and that's what I plan to do."

With that he lets go and quickly begins to descend the ladder. The others look at one another and decide they're not destined for anything more than keeping watch, and you can't blame them. This is all a lot to take in..but you descend after Brayden anyway.

...

Brayden let's go of the ladder once he gets to the bottom and takes a torch hanging from the wall, giving you the lamp once your foot meets the ground.

There's one long passage leading into the darkness from where you stand, natural rock formations surround you. This was no ordinary basement..this was a cave.

Brayden turns around after a moment, "You got a knife?"

You nod in the dim light, the cool air sending shivers down your spine but some part of you mystified by the adventurous nature of this whole set of events.

"Now would be a good time to keep it handy." And with that he draws his own blade, keeping the torch in his left hand, and begins slowly making his way down the passageway.

You rummage in {s}'s bag, pulling out the knife she gave you.

It must have taken ages to dig out...It seems to go on and on as you keep walking, and you nearly drop your lamp when you see it expand into a full blown underground temple. The thumping is louder now too, still pitch black though.

"What the hell is this?" You ask.

Brayden looks back at you momentarily, "I've seen a lot of weird stuff in my time, never have I seen something like this."

He resumes his slow pace, carefully stepping over the rocks on the brick laden floor.

"Who built this? How did they keep it secret?" Your voice echoes against the torchlit walls.

Brayden merely shrugs and keeps walking.

The place is massive, it keeps stretching on in all directions, and after a bit of exploring you both decide to head straight since that seems to be where the sound is coming from.

You walk down some of those stairs...

And then some more...

And even more...

Before long you were returning to your dream hypothesis. This must be a coma, just some really long dream, but that revelation didn't make you want to stop going down.

Eventually you saw light. At first, you thought it was your eyes tricking you, but as the stairs started to even out to flat ground, you saw torches on the sides of the cavern, and then, looking out across an unimaginably vast cavern, you see thousands of torches lighting the walls. Tiki torches evenly spaced across the ground reveal the source of the sounds, a short fellow beating a massive drum in the middle of what appeared to be a ritual.

A massive ritual, symbolism covering the walls and decorating pictures and drawings all over the walls. There were hundreds, probably thousands of people present, all wearing robes or in some cases with the women, nothing at all. That is, except masks. They were all wearing a variety of masks, celebrating a central event which you couldn't quite make out.

"What in the world did you and {s} get involved with?" Brayden asks, kneeling at the edge of what you now knew to be a balcony, looking down upon the event.

"I've no clue...to tell you the truth this whole journey has been a daze. What should we do?"

Brayden thought for a moment, examining the event from afar, then gasps. "Look! {s}!" He points to a figure being brought into the cavern in chains, a caged lion being transported in behind her.

"Not good...how are we supposed to get them out? We can't fight all those people!" You lean on tan outcrop, when suddenly it gives way and you feel yourself sliding into the hordes of people below. "BRAYDEN!!" You shout, and lose your lantern and the knife amongst the falling rocks.

You look up and didn't see anybody, you hope he was just hiding from the masses. Everyone turns to you, hearing your shout, and you see hundreds of dark robes begin to shuffle your direction.

"BRING HIM TO ME!" Came a shout from a familiar Pennybags twin. {T} waves his cane and the figures draw ever closer. It's now or never, what do you do?